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In actuality, however, plants do not absorb all incoming sunlight (due to reflection, respiration requirements of photosynthesis and the need for optimal solar radiation levels) and do not convert all harvested energy into biomass, which results in a maximum overall photosynthetic efficiency of 3 to 6% of total solar radiation. [1]
The coordination of inputs and outputs of these two processes creates a completely interconnected system, constituting the underlying functioning of the ecosystems overall respiration. It is the operation in which the organisms within a specified ecosystem use the process of respiration to convert organic carbon to carbon dioxide.
In general outline, photosynthesis is the opposite of cellular respiration: while photosynthesis is a process of reduction of carbon dioxide to carbohydrates, cellular respiration is the oxidation of carbohydrates or other nutrients to carbon dioxide. Nutrients used in cellular respiration include carbohydrates, amino acids and fatty acids.
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).
The oxygenation reaction of RuBisCO is a wasteful process because 3-phosphoglycerate is created at a lower rate and higher metabolic cost compared with RuBP carboxylase activity. While photorespiratory carbon cycling results in the formation of G3P eventually, around 25% of carbon fixed by photorespiration is re-released as CO 2 [ 2 ] and ...
The CO 2 compensation point (Γ) is the CO 2 concentration at which the rate of photosynthesis exactly matches the rate of respiration. There is a significant difference in Γ between C 3 plants and C 4 plants: on land, the typical value for Γ in a C 3 plant ranges from 40–100 μmol/mol, while in C 4 plants the values are lower at 3–10 μmol/mol. Plants with a weaker CCM, such as C2 ...
Due to non-predatory death, egestion, and cellular respiration, a significant amount of energy is lost to the environment instead of being absorbed for production by consumers. The figure approximates the fraction of energy available after each stage of energy loss in a typical ecosystem, although these fractions vary greatly from ecosystem to ...
C 4 photosynthesis reduces photorespiration by concentrating CO 2 around RuBisCO. To enable RuBisCO to work in a cellular environment where there is a lot of carbon dioxide and very little oxygen, C 4 leaves generally contain two partially isolated compartments called mesophyll cells and bundle-sheath cells.