Reply To This Post         Return to Posts Index           VegSource Home

From:	alevelresource (93.93.218.199)
Subject:	Re: Cells run on ATP, not glucose, right?
Date:	November 2, 2012 at 6:39 am PST

In Reply to: Re: Cells run on ATP, not glucose, right? posted by Dr. Doug Graham on October 1, 2012 at 9:29 pm:

Yes. ATP is the universal energy source as when it is hyrdolysed you get small manageable amounts of energy that are predictable: 30.6kJ! glucose is a huge source of potential chemical energy (the same kind that ATP contains) but it has many different types of bonds as it is a complex molecule.. meaning that when different bonds are broken during hydrolysis (of glucose) the amount of energy released may not be small and manageable, and won't be PREDICTABLE. This means huge amounts of energy could be released, some of which will be as heat energy, which could cause proteins such as enzymes to become denatured, damaging our cell.

ATP is the high energy intermediate compund formed from the respiration of complex organic molecules such as glucose- it is found in all cells. It can be hydrolysed to give ADP and Pi and small amounts of energy that are small enough to not damage the cel or be wasted :-)

Reply To This Post         Return to Posts Index           VegSource Home