5.11A: The Purpose and Process of Photosynthesis
- Describe the process of photosynthesis
The Importance of Photosynthesis
The processes of all organisms—from bacteria to humans—require energy. To get this energy, many organisms access stored energy by eating food. Carnivores eat other animals and herbivores eat plants. But where does the stored energy in food originate? All of this energy can be traced back to the process of photosynthesis and light energy from the sun.
Photosynthesis is essential to all life on earth. It is the only biological process that captures energy from outer space (sunlight) and converts it into chemical energy in the form of G3P (
Glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate) which in turn can be made into sugars and other molecular compounds. Plants use these compounds in all of their metabolic processes; plants do not need to consume other organisms for food because they build all the molecules they need. Unlike plants, animals need to consume other organisms to consume the molecules they need for their metabolic processes.
The Process of Photosynthesis
During photosynthesis, molecules in leaves capture sunlight and energize electrons, which are then stored in the covalent bonds of carbohydrate molecules. That energy within those covalent bonds will be released when they are broken during cell respiration. How long lasting and stable are those covalent bonds? The energy extracted today by the burning of coal and petroleum products represents sunlight energy captured and stored by photosynthesis almost 200 million years ago.
Plants, algae, and a group of bacteria called cyanobacteria are the only organisms capable of performing photosynthesis. Because they use light to manufacture their own food, they are called photoautotrophs (“self-feeders using light”). Other organisms, such as animals, fungi, and most other bacteria, are termed heterotrophs (“other feeders”) because they must rely on the sugars produced by photosynthetic organisms for their energy needs. A third very interesting group of bacteria synthesize sugars, not by using sunlight’s energy, but by extracting energy from inorganic chemical compounds; hence, they are referred to as chemoautotrophs.
The importance of photosynthesis is not just that it can capture sunlight’s energy. A lizard sunning itself on a cold day can use the sun’s energy to warm up. Photosynthesis is vital because it evolved as a way to store the energy in solar radiation (the “photo-” part) as high-energy electrons in the carbon-carbon bonds of carbohydrate molecules (the “-synthesis” part). Those carbohydrates are the energy source that heterotrophs use to power the synthesis of ATP via respiration. Therefore, photosynthesis powers 99 percent of Earth’s ecosystems. When a top predator, such as a wolf, preys on a deer, the wolf is at the end of an energy path that went from nuclear reactions on the surface of the sun, to light, to photosynthesis, to vegetation, to deer, and finally to wolf.
Key Points
- Photosynthesis evolved as a way to store the energy in solar radiation as high-energy electrons in carbohydrate molecules.
- Plants, algae, and cyanobacteria, known as photoautotrophs, are the only organisms capable of performing photosynthesis.
- Heterotrophs, unable to produce their own food, rely on the carbohydrates produced by photosynthetic organisms for their energy needs.
Key Terms
- photosynthesis : the process by which plants and other photoautotrophs generate carbohydrates and oxygen from carbon dioxide, water, and light energy in chloroplasts
- photoautotroph : an organism that can synthesize its own food by using light as a source of energy
- chemoautotroph : a simple organism, such as a protozoan, that derives its energy from chemical processes rather than photosynthesis