C3, C4, CAM Plants

C3 PLANTS:
In C3 plants, it's initial fixation of carbon occurs in the rubisco(the enzyme that catalyzes the first step of carbon fixation), because the first organic product of carbon fixation is a three-carbon compound, 3- phosphoglycerate. C3 plants thrive in cool, wet, and cloudy climates, where light levels may be low, because the metabolic pathway is more energy efficient. If there seems to be a good amount of water in the area, the stomata can stay open and let in more carbon dioxide. C3 plants produce less food when their stomata closes on hot,dry days. When O2 concentrations are higher than CO2 concentrations photorespiration occurs and thus generates no ATP, and produces no food for the organism. Examples of C3 plants include rice, wheat, and soybeans.

C4 PLANTS:
Within C4 plants, they use the Calvin cycle with an alternate mode of carbon fixation that forms a four-carbon compound as its first product. In C4 plants, there are two types of photosynthetic cells: bundle-sheath cells and mesophyll cells. In the process, the enzyme PEP carboxylase adds CO2 to PEP. PEP carboxylase has a very high affinity for CO2, and can fix CO2 efficiently when rubisco cannot. When temperatures are hot and dry and the stomata are partially closed, this causes C02 concentration in the leaf to fall and the O2 concentration to rise. In this way, C4 photosynthesis minimizes photorespiration and enhances sugar production. Examples of these plants include sugarcane, corn, and members of the grass family.

CAM PLANTS:
CAM Plants open their stomata during the night and close them during the day, basically the reverse of what other plants normally do. Closing the stomata during the day helps desert plants conserve water, but it also prevents CO2 from entering the leaves. When it's night the stomata of the plant are open and they take up CO2 and make them into a variety of organic acids. This type of carbon fixation is called CAM. The CAM plants store the acids that they make during the night into their vacuoles until the morning when the stomata closes. Then during the day when light reactions can provide ATP and NADPH for the Calvin cycle, CO2 is released from the organic acids that were made during night and made into sugars. Examples of CAM plants include many cacti, and pineapples.

Sources: Campbell Book.
Picture from: Campbell online book.

How the structure of macromolecules affects their function

5 Things I Learned from the 3D Molecules
- Fats are constructed by the joining of a glycerol molecule to three fatty acids by dehydration reaction and also fats store large amounts of energy.
- A function of a protein depends on its specific sequence or form; proteins consists of a series of polypeptide chains.
-Carbohydrates like monosaccharides serve as an fast and easy source of fuel.
-RNA has a ribose as its pentose and DNA has deoxyribose.
-Glycosidic bonds help demonstrate how different bonds produce different products.

How the structure of macromolecules affects their function
Most macromolecules are polymers. Carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids are the four major classes of organic compounds in cells. Some of these compounds are very large and are called macromolecules.Polymers are chains of identical or similar building blocks called monomers. Each class of polymer is formed from a specific set of monomers. Although some organisms share the same number of monomers, each organism is unique because of the specfic structure of it's macromolecules.

As for carbohydrates, the smallest carbohydrates serve as fuel and carbon sources. Monosaccharides, the simplest of the bunch can be broken down easily. Disaccharides consists of two monosaccharides connected by a glycosidic linkage. These glycosidic bonds help demonstrate how different bonds like these produce different products. Things such as simple sugars, starch, glycogen, and celluose differ in the positions and orientations of their glycosidic linkages and thus serve and have different functions.

For lipids, the way the fats are constructed differentiate themselves from being a fat, a phospholipid and a steroid. Fats, also known as triacylglycerols are constructed by the joining of a glycerol molecule to three fatty acids by dehydration rections, fats store large amounts of energy. Phospholipids on the other hand have fats that have a third fatty acid linked to glycrol, and this is what makes phospholipids mahor components of the cell membrane, because phosphipids have a negatively charged phosphate group, making the "head" of a phosphlipid hydrophillic. Also, steroids have a basic structure of four fused rings of carbon atoms, and because of this steroids have other functions such as enhancement and causing cholesterol.

A protein consists of one or more polypeptide chains folded into a specific three-dimensional conformation. A protein's function depends on its specific sequence or form. The primary structure of a protein is its unique sequence of amino acids. Different sequence of amino acids could cause the enzyme to go wack and be an enzyme for something else. This is why the sequence of amino acids for this case is important because it does determine it's function. For nucleic acids they store and transmit hereditary information. DNA stores information from the synthesis of specific proteins, RNA carries this genetic information to he protein- synthesizing place. Each nucleotide monomer has a pentose covalently bonded to a phosphate group and to one of four different nitrogenous bases. RNA has a ribose as its pentose and DNA has deoxyribose and this is why differentiates them from having different functions because even though they are a protein, differences like these change the function of it.

Sources: Campbell book.
http://biomodel.uah.es/en/model3/index.htm
Pictures: concord.org

biochemistry!

The most important thing to know is that matter consists of chemical elements, and these elements are the starting point of compounds. Knowing that, we can say that atomic structure determines the behavior of an element. Knowing the behavior of an element helps determine whether an element will bond covalently or by ionic depending on the type of element, valence electrons and electronegativity. Polar and nonpolar compounds help determine why or how a certain compound is hydrophilic or hydrophobic. The reason why water is so important is because it is the universal solvent, it has a neutral pH, and it's weak hydrogen bonds ( the polarity of water results in hydrogen bonding) make it possible to have cohesion and adhesion because of it's easy breaking of the bonds. Carbon plays a very important role in chemistry because of it's versatility, because of it's shape it is able to bond with many other elements and itself. The differences in carbon skeletons contributes to the diversity of organic molecules. Also, functional groups give the overall molecule distinctive chemical properties. Macromolecules are especially important because it contains things like carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, and etc. Carbohydrates acts as field and building material. Lipids are able to store large amounts of energies, and actually help with growth( steroids). There is also DNA which stores and transmit hereditary information, thus relating to the major theme evolution.

ecology words!

The whole point of this ecological unit was to see that the interactions between organisms and their environments determine the distribution and abundance of organisms. This is why we have words in like behavior, community, population, ecological niche. All these words contribute to organisms' behavior and habitat. Biomes, community, and population is important because based on their behavior and community, one can tell whether one is suitable for an environment and how they are able to thrive or not be able to adapt as well and thus hurting their population and causing a change in population growth. One major important word in this unit is energy. Energy transfer and it's efficiency between trophic levels is important because it impacts an organism's population rate and their ability to thrive in a habitat or not. Two important things of any population is density and the spacing of individuals. Things like limited resources impact an organism, such as it's biodiversity and it's biomass within a particular area. Chemical cycles such as the carbon cycle, water cycle, and etc are very important because it's what regulates essential elements to the earth. Which helps the environment and the organisms living in it.