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Although physiologic respiration is necessary to sustain cellular respiration and thus life in animals, the processes are distinct: cellular respiration takes place in individual cells of the organism, while physiologic respiration concerns the diffusion and transport of metabolites between the organism and the external environment.
Although cellular respiration is technically a combustion reaction, it is an unusual one because of the slow, controlled release of energy from the series of reactions. Nutrients that are commonly used by animal and plant cells in respiration include sugar, amino acids and fatty acids, and the most common oxidizing agent is molecular oxygen (O 2).
Anaerobic cellular respiration and fermentation generate ATP in very different ways, and the terms should not be treated as synonyms. Cellular respiration (both aerobic and anaerobic) uses highly reduced chemical compounds such as NADH and FADH 2 (for example produced during glycolysis and the citric acid cycle) to establish an electrochemical gradient (often a proton gradient) across a membrane.
In a process known as cellular respiration, these organisms use oxygen to oxidize substrates (for example sugars and fats) and generate energy. [6] Facultative anaerobes use oxygen if it is available, but also have anaerobic methods of energy production. [7]
[5] [6] Two examples of obligate anaerobes are Clostridium botulinum and the bacteria which live near hydrothermal vents on the deep-sea ocean floor. Aerotolerant organisms, which cannot use oxygen for growth, but tolerate its presence. [7] Facultative anaerobes, which can grow without oxygen but use oxygen if it is present. [7]
Anaerobic respiration is correspondingly less efficient than aerobic respiration. In the absence of oxygen, not all of the carbon-carbon bonds in glucose can be broken to release energy. A great deal of extractable energy is left in the waste products. Anaerobic respiration generally occurs in prokaryotes in environments that do not contain oxygen.
Many aquatic animals have developed gills for respiration which are specifically adapted to their function. In fish, for example, they have: A large surface area to allow as much oxygen to enter the gills as possible because more of the gas comes into contact with the membrane; Good blood supply to maintain the concentration gradient needed
Examples of alternative electron acceptors include sulfate, nitrate, iron, manganese, mercury, and carbon monoxide. [8] Fermentation differs from anaerobic respiration in that the pyruvate generated from glycolysis is broken down without the involvement of an electron transport chain (i.e. there is no oxidative phosphorylation).