Energy and Respiration Flashcards
Where do living organisms gain their continuous supply of energy from?
- Absorption of light energy
2. Chemical potential energy (energy stored in nutrient molecules)
What does photosynthesis do and supply living organisms with?
- Transfers light energy into chemical potential energy
- An energy supply and usable carbon compounds
What do all biological macromolecules uses (e.g. carbohydrates, lipids and proteins) contain?
- Carbon
- All living organisms therefore need a source of carbon
What are autotrophs?
- An organism that can trap an inorganic carbon source (carbon dioxide) using energy from light or from chemical
- Organisms that can use an inorganic carbon source in the from of carbon dioxide
What are heterotrophs?
- An organism needing. supply of organic molecules as its carbon source
- Organisms needing a ready-made organic supply of carbon
What is an organic molecule?
- A compound including carbon and hydrogen
- The term originally meant a molecule derived from an organism, but now includes all compounds of carbon and hydrogen even if they do not occur naturally
How can organic molecules be used?
- Serve as ‘building blocks’ for making other organic molecules that are essential to the organism
- They can represent chemical potential energy that can be released by breaking down the molecules in respiration
- This energy can then be used for all forms of work
What is the relationship between heterotrophs and autotrophs?
Heterotrophs depend on autotrophs for both materials and energy
What does work in a living organism include?
- The synthesis of complex substances from simpler ones (anabolic reactions), such as the synthesis of polysaccharides from monosaccharides, lipids from glycerol; and fatty acids, polypeptides from amino acids and nucleic acids from nucleotides
- The active transport of substances against a diffusion gradient such as the activity of the sodium-potassium pump
- Mechanical work such as muscle contraction and other cellular movements; for example the movement of cilia and flagella, amoeboid movements and the movement of vesicles through cytoplasm
- In a few organisms, bioluminescence and electrical discharge
How do mammals and birds maintain a constant body temperature?
- Mammals and birds use thermal energy (heat) that is released from metabolic reactions to maintaining a constant body temperature
- Mammals and birds are endotherms releasing enrich thermal energy within their bodies to moaning them above the temperature of their surrounding when necessary
- They also maintain a constant body temperature through negative feedback loops
What are ectotherms?
- Most animals are ectotherms
- The thermal energy that warms them comes from outside their bodies
How can living organisms do work?
-Energy requiring reactions must be linked to those that yield energy
-In the complete oxidation of glucose (C6H12O6) in aerobic conditions, a large quantity of energy is made available
(Respiration equation and 2870kJ)
How do reactions in order to do work take place?
- Reaction such as this take place in a series of small steps, each releasing a small quantity of the total available energy
- Multi-step reactions allow precise control via feedback mechanisms
- Moreover the cell could not usefully harness the total available energy if all of it were made available at one instant
Why is the complete oxidation of glucose to carbon diode and water no happen very easily?
Despite its very high energy yield, glucose is quite stable because of the activation energy that has to be added before any reaction takes place
How is the activation energy overcome?
- In living organisms the activation energy is overcome by lowering it using enzymes
- Also by raising the energy level of the glucose by phosphorylation
How is energy harnessed at each step in respiration?
- Theoretically the energy released from each step of respiration could be harnessed directly to some form of work in the cell
- However a much more flexible system occurs in which energy-welding reaction in all organisms are used to make in intermediary molecule ATP
How is ATP broken apart?
- When a phosphate group is removed from ATP, adenosine diphosphate (ADP) is formed and 30.5 kJmol-1 of energy is released
- Removal of a second phosphate produce adenosine monophosphate (AMP) and 30.5 kJmol-1 of energy is again released
- Removal of the last phosphate leaving adenosine resale only 14.2kJmol-1
What are all of these reactions with ATP?
reversible
Which reaction is most important for providing energy for the cell?
-It is the interconversion of ATP and ADP that is all-important in providing energy for the cell
ATP + H2O (reversible arrow) ADP + H3PO4 ±30.5kJ
What is the rate of interconversion of ATP and ADP?
- The rate of interconversion or turnover is enormous
- It is estimated that a resting human uses about 40kg of ATP in 24 hours, but at any one time contains only about 5g of ATP
- During strenuous exercise, ATP breakdown may be as much as 0.5kg per minute
Describe ATP
- The cell’s energy-yielding reactions are linked to ATP synthesis
- The ATP is then used by the cell in all forms of work
- ATP is the universal intermediary molecules between energy-yielding and energy-requiring reactions used in a cell, whatever the type of cell
- In other words, ATP is the ‘energy currency’ of the cell
How is ATP suitable for its role?
- The cell ‘trades’ in ATP weather than making use of a number of different intermediates
- Suitable for role as readily hydrolysed to related energy and it is small and water soluble
- This allows it to be easily transported around the cell
What are energy transfers?
inefficient
Why are energy transfers inefficient?
- Some energy is converted to thermal energy whenever energy is transferred
- At the different stages in a multi-step reaction such as respiration, the energy made available may not perfectly correspond with the energy needed to synthesis ATP
- Any excess energy is converted to thermal energy
- Many energy-requiring reaction in cells also used less very that that realised by hydrolyses of ATP and ADP and any extra energy will be realised as thermal energy
What is an energy currency molecule?
An energy currency molecule acts as the immediate donor of energy to the cell’s energy required reactions
What is an energy storage molecule?
An energy storage molecule is a short term (glucose or sucrose) or long term (glycogen, starch or triglyceride) store of chemical potential energy
Where does energy for ATP synthesis come from?
- Respiration
2. Electrical potential energy
How does the energy for ATP synthesis come from respiration?
In respiration energy related by reorgansing chemical bonds (chemical potential energy) during glycolysis and the Krebs cycle is used to make some ATP
How does the energy for ATP synthesis come from electrical potential energy?
- Most ATP in cells is generated using electrical potential energy
- This energy is from the transfer of electron by electron carriers in mitochondria and chloroplasts
- It is stored as a difference in proton (hydrogen ion) concentration across some phospholipid membranes in mitochondria and chloroplasts which are essentially impermeable to protons
What happens to protons as a result of the concentration difference?
- Protons are then allowed to flow down they concentration gradient (by facilitated diffusion) through a protein that spans the phospholipid bilayer
- Part of this protein acts as an enzyme that synthesises ATP and is called ATP synthase
- The transfer of three protons allows the production of one ATP molecule provided that ADP and inorganic phosphate group (Pi) are available inside the organelle
- This process (chemisosmosis) occurs in both mitochondria and chloroplasts
Describe the structure of ATP synthase
- Three bidding sites and a part of the molecules (gamma) that rotates as hydrogen ions (H+) pass
- This produced structural changes in the binding sites and allows them to pass sequentially through three phases
1. Binding ADP and Pi
2. Forming tightly bound ATP
3. Releasing ATP
What is active transport?
- Active transport is the emolument of molecules or ions across a partially permeable membrane against a concentration gradient
- Energy is needs from ATP to counteract the tendency of these particles to move by diffusion down the gradient
What is the sodium potassium pump?
- All cells show difference in the concentration of ions in auricular sodium and potassium ions, inside the cell with respect to the surrounding solution
- Most cells seem to have sodium pumps in the cell surface membrane that pump sodium ions out of the cell
- This is usually coupled with the ability to pump potassium ions from the surrounding solution into he cell
Describe how the sodium potassium pump works
- The sodium potassium pump is a protein that spans the cell surface membrane
- It has binding sites for doom ions (Na+) and for ATP on the inner side, and for potassium ion (K+) on the outer side
- The proteins acts as an ATPase and catalyses the hydrolysis of ATP to ADP and inorganic phosphate related energy to drive the pump
- Changes in the shape of the protein move sodium and potassium ions across the membrane in opposite directions
What happens for each ATP used?
For each ATP used, two potassium ions move into the cell and three sodium ions move out of the cell
Why is a potential difference created?
- As only two potassium ions are added to the cell contents for every three sodium ions removed, a potential difference is created across the membrane that is negative inside with respect to the outside
- Both sodium and potassium ions leak back across the membrane, down their diffusion gradients
- However cell surface membranes are much less permeable to sodium ions than potassium ions so this diffusion actually increases the potential difference across the membrane
What is one of the specialisations of the nerve cell?
An exaggeration of the. potential difference across the cell surface membrane as a result of the activity of the sodium potassium pump
How important is active transport in ion movement into and out of cell?
Very important as about 50% of the ATP is used by a resting mammal is devoted to maintaining the ionic content of cells
What is respiration?
- Enzymatic release of energy from organic compounds in living cells
- Respiration is a process in which organic molecules act as a fuel
What happens to the organic molecules in respiration?
The organic molecules are broken down in a series of stages to release chemical potential energy, which is used to synthesise ATP
What is the main fuel for most cells?
- Carbohydrate, usually glucose
- Many cells can use inky glucose as their respiratory substrate but other break down fatty acids, glycerol and amino acids in respiration
What are the four stages of glucose breakdown?
- Glycolysis
- Link reaction
- Krebs cycle
- Oxidative phosphorylation
What is glycolysis?
- Glycolysis is the splitting or lysis or glucose
- It is a multi-step process in which a glucose molecule with six carbon atoms is eventually split into two molecules of pyruvate, each with three carbon atoms
How is ATP related to glycolysis?
- Energy from ATP is needed in the first steps, but energy is released in the later steps, when it can be used to make ATP
- There is a net gain of two ATP molecules per molecule of glucose broken down
Where does glycolysis take place?
In the cytoplasm of a cell
What is and happens in the first stage of glycolysis?
- In the first stage, phosphorylation, glucose is phosphorylated using ATP
- Glucose is energy rich but does not react easily so to tap the bond energy of glucose, energy muscle first be sued to make the reaction easier
- Two ATP molecules are used for each molecule of glucose to make first glucose phosphate and then fructose phosphate and then fructose bisphosphate, which breaks down to produce two molecules of triose phosphate
What happens to the triose phosphate in glycolysis?
- Hydrogen is then removed from triose phosphate and transferred to the carrier molecule NAD (nicotinamide adenine dinucelotide)
- Two molecules of reduced NAD are produced for each molecule of glucose entering glycolysis
- The hydrogens carried by reduced NAD can easily be transferred to other molecules and are used in oxidative phosphorylation to generate ATP
Describe the end product of glycolysis
- The end product of glycolysis, pyruvate, still contains a great deal of chemical potential energy
- When free oxygen is available some of this energy can be released via the Krebs cycle and oxidative phosphorylation
- However the pyruvate first enters the link reaction which takes place in the mitochondria
What is the first stage of the link reaction?
Pyruvate passes by active transport from the cytoplasm, through the outer and inner membranes of a mitochondrion and into the mitochondrial matrix
What happens to the pyruvate in the mitochondrial matrix?
- It is decarboxylated (carbon dioxide is removed),
- Dehydrogenated (hydrogen is removed)
- Combined with coenzyme A (CoA) to give acetyl coenzyme A
- This is known as the link reaction
What is coenzyme A?
- Coenzyme A is a complex molecule composed of a nucleoside (adenine plus ribose) with a vitamin (pantothenic acid) and acts as a carrier of acetyl groups to the Krebs cycle
- The hydrogen removed from pyruvate is transferred to NAD
What else can be used to produce acetyl coenzyme A?
- Fatty acids from fat metabolism may also e side to reduce acetyl coenzyme A
- Fatty acids are broken down in the mitochondrion in a cycle of reactions in which each turn of the cycle shortens the fatty acid chain by a two-carbon acetyl unit
- Each of these can react with coenzyme A to produce acetyl coenzyme A, which, like that produced from pyruvate now enters the Krebs cycle
What is the Krebs cycle?
- A cycle of reactions in aerobic respiration in the matrix of the mitochondrion in which hydrogens pass to hydrogen carriers for subsequent ATP synthesis and some ATP is synthesised directly
- A closed pathway of enzyme controlled reactions