vargas island, summer, 2010

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Summary of our Carbon lesson


This is a summary of our notes today (below).  You can see that glucose production and consumption are driving forces for many of our adaptations.  You eat, breathe, and get rid of waste to serve some basic biochemistry going on inside your cells.

CARBON IN AN ECOSYTEM

CARBON HAS 3 IMPORTANT ROLES IN AN ECOSYSTEM

1.     CARBON IS A BUILDING BLOCK for all life
2.    CARBON IS USED AS FUEL FOR ENERGY
3.    CARBON IS RECYCLED WITHIN THE ECOSYSTEM AND ON EARTH

1.    CARBON IS A BUILDING BLOCK for all life:
a.   All life forms within an ecosystem are made of carbon:  plants, animals, fungi, algae, microbes.  The carbohydrates, fats and proteins within these life forms are made of carbon
b.   Carbon is captured by plants through PHOTOSYNTHESIS and is used to make plants grow
c.   The plants form the basis of the food web because animals get their carbon by eating plants.  Carnivores get their carbon by eating herbivores



PLANTS USE THE GLUCOSE MADE BY PHOTOSYNTHESIS FOR MANY PURPOSES:
              AS FUEL
              AS STORED GLUCOSE:  in the form of starch like in a potato
       AS CELLULOSE TO GROW BIGGER.  : in the form of fibre or CELLULOSE, like the fibrous parts of a celery,
the cell wall of a plant, the trunk of a tree.

2.  CARBON IS FUEL FOR ENERGY: 
a.   CELLULAR RESPIRATION takes place within both animal and plant cells
b.   Cellular respiration causes ADP (adenosine diphosphate) to turn into ATP (or adenosine triphosphate.)



c.   ATP is used by all life forms for energy: After ATP is used, then it turns back into ADP
                                     i.     Movement
                                   ii.     Heat
                                 iii.     Inner cell workings
                                 iv.     Animals use more ATP than plants because animals move more
                                   v.     An analogy is to think about ADP as a rechargeable battery and ATP as the charged up form. 

d.  Cellular respiration explains why animals need to eat (to obtain glucose) and breathe (to get oxygen) and exhale (to get rid of carbon dioxide) and also pee (to get rid of excess water. 

3.  CARBON IS CYCLED IN THE ECOSYSTEM

Plants, and other producers, take in carbon dioxide and water to make glucose and oxygen
Animals and other consumers take in oxygen and glucose and make carbon dioxide and water.