基礎生産
Primary production can be broken down into gross and net primary production. Gross primary production is a measure of the energy that a photoautotroph harvests from the sun. Take, for example, a blade of grass that takes in "x" joules of energy from the sun. The fraction of that energy that is converted into glucose reflects the gross productivity of the blade of grass. The energy remaining after respiration is considered the net primary production. In general, gross production refers to the energy contained within an organism before respiration and net production the energy after respiration. The terms can be used to describe energy transfer in both autotrophs and heterotrophs.