vocab words
Autotrophic Cell
A cell that can capture energy from sunlight or chemicals and use it to produce its own food from inorganic compounds.
Metabolism
These are all biochemical processes of an organism.
Reactants
These are the elements or compounds that enter into a chemical reaction.
Photosynthesis
This is a chemical process that uses light to process carbon dioxide in plants.
Light Dependent
This is a chemical reaction in a plant that converts solar to chemical energy.
Polysaccharide
This is a complex carbohydrate made from many different sugar molecules joined together.
Carbohydrate
This is a compound made up of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen atoms; it is used by cells to store and release energy. Sugars are made by chloroplasts through photosynthesis and consumed by mitochondria through cell respiration.
Light Independent Reactions
This is a series of biochemical reactions in photosynthesis that do not require light to proceed and produce the organic molecule, glucose, from carbon dioxide.
Calvin Cycle
This is a series of chemical reactions that take place in the chloroplasts and occur as part of the dark reactions of photosynthesis.
Electron Transport Chain
This is a series of energy-producing chemical reactions, which produce 34 ATP for the cell, occur in the mitochondria, and form the last step of aerobic cellular respiration
Anaerobic
This is a simple biological process not requiring oxygen
Glucose
This is a simple sugar that provides energy to organisms.
Mitochondrion
An organelle found in most eukaryotic cells described as "cellular power plants", because their primary function is to convert organic materials into energy in the form of ATP
Light Energy
Energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation. Most often associated with a wavelength that is visible to the eye.
Chemical Energy
Energy stored in chemical bonds of molecules.
Net Energy
In any food web, this is the energy available to organisms for maintenance, production, and reproduction.
Energy
The capacity for doing work. It may be transformed from one form to another.
Pigment
This is a substance that helps determine the color of reflected or transmitted light as the result of wavelength-selective absorption.
Autotroph
This is an organism that obtains its energy from inorganic substances or from the sun.
Heterotroph
This is an organism that relies on complex organic substances for nutrition.
Producer
This is an organism that supplies matter and energy, also known as an autotroph.
Phosphate Group
This is one of the three components of a nucleotide that contains phosphorus.
ADP
This is short for adenosine diphosphate. An organic compound that is composed of adenosine and two phosphate groups. With the addition of another phosphate group, it is converted to ATP for the storage of energy during cell metabolism. It then forms again, from ATP, when a phosphate group is removed to release energy
Glycolysis
This is the anaerobic process that splits glucose into two molecules of pyruvic acid.
NADH
This is the electron carrier in cellular respiration.
NADPH
This is the electron carrier in photosynthesis.
Carbon Dioxide
This is the gas produced as a result of respiration.
ATP
This is the main energy storage and transfer molecule in the cell.
ATP Cycle
This is the name applied to the cycle by which ATP are broken down to ADP with the release of energy, and the regeneration of ATP from ADP through the process of phosphorylation.
Cellular Respiration
This is the process that releases energy by breaking down food molecules in the presence of oxygen.
Kreb\'s Cycle
This is the second stage of cellular respiration and takes place in the mitochondrial matrix. During this stage the decomposition of pyruvate to carbon dioxide is completed
Solar Energy
This is the utilization of radiation from the sun.
Pyruvate
This substance is made from glucose through glycolysis, and supplies energy to living cells through the Krebs cycle when oxygen is present (aerobic respiration), and alternatively ferments to produce lactate when oxygen is lacking (fermentation).
