photosynthasis: how

[TK2K]

alright, every 2nd grader knows that plants take in sunlight and turn it into "food" aka glucose

how
i mean, how does sunlight, a photon, turn into all of the elements that makes up glucose?

 

[Qriz]

6 CO2 + 6 H2O + light ? C6H12O6 + 6 O2

Carbon Dioxide + Water + Light energy ? Glucose + Oxygen

They take in carbon dioxide, water and light energy, do their crazy stuff (did an enourmous study on exactly how these reactions work, and it's quite a process) and the result is glucose, which they can use, and oxygen which is great for us.

 

[BrownTown]

Yes, the chemical reaction is quite simply, a plant takes carbon dioxide from the air and water from the ground and combines it together to make glucose (which it uses to build even more complicated stuff). However, the reaction proceeds via a HUGE number of intermediates, you can simply google it and see them all if you want. But the molocule chlotophyl absorbes energy from sunlight and to power the reaction.

Basically the chloroplasts use light to turn the low energy ADP and NADP+ moluclues into the more energetic ATP and NADPH. These two chemicals then release their energy though the Calvin cycle which fixes carbon into sugar.

Energy is transfered up the chain:
light energy->chemical intermediates->simple sugars->complex sugars

EDIT: here, I spent the 5 seconds on Google you should have before you asked this question and found you a link. Google Is Your Friend

 

[Peter]

... that, and it's "photosynthesis". Google only works well if you know how to spell what you're looking for

 

[oynaz]

^^

Wrong. In this case, Google suggests the right spelling ;-)