METABOLISM AND ENERGY

3.1

RELEASE AND USE OF ENERGY

 Metabolic reactions involve lot of anabolic and catabolic reactions.
 During these reactions energy is packed and released from the bonds.
These reactions occurs in step by step sequence called as metabolic
pathway, in which a substrate breaks down into products and products
becomes substrate.
 Energy is released and packed during these processes.
 Energy is defined as capacity to do work, however during this metabolic
pathway energy is lost, consumed and transformed.
 There are two types of energies, kinetic energy: Energy of motion.
 Potential energy: Energy that is stored but available to work.
 In all living cells there are thousands of reactions going on, which involves
flow of energy. This flow of energy involves transformation of potential
energy into kinetic energy.
 However, these reactions cannot go on without the use of enzymes, which
act like catalyst, without the use of these enzymes reactions would not
occur.
 Kinetic energy of particles, moving in random
direction, is thermal energy; an increase in the
kinetic energy of particles of an object, increases the
temperature of the object.
 Potential energy of particles is chemical energy
which is stored in the chemical bonds.
 Heat is the transfer of energy from one object to
other due to temperature change
 Bond energy

 Bond energy is the amount of energy needed to break

the bond which is the same as energy needed to form
the bond.
 Some energy is released (wasted) to form a bond,
therefore, it can be said that the free unbounded
atoms contain more chemical energy compared to
any chemical bond.
 Refer figure 3.2

 The amount of energy released during cell reaction is called thermal

energy and this is the energy which is used to bring about different
cell activities like membrane transport, transmission of impulse,
muscle contractions etc.

 Apart form these activities energy released from one reaction is also
used to make another reaction occur as a part of metabolic pathway.

 The amount of energy released in cell reaction is so high that it can

burn the cells, therefore nature has made sure that the energy
released by exothermic reaction is utilised to bring about
endothermic reaction, this way the temperature of the body is
maintained to specific range.
 Laws of thermodynamics

 This flow of energy is governed by the laws of

thermodynamics.
 The first law of thermodynamics is also called the law of
conservation of energy.
 This law states energy can neither be created nor
destroyed.
 Energy is tapped from sun by the plants, gets bonded in
the bonds as potential energy, at some point it is released
and transformed in different forms, in this process some
of the energy is also wasted or lost in the surroundings.
 However, the total amount of energy in the universe
remains constant.
 Second law of Thermodynamics:

 This law deals with disorder in the universe, called entropy.

 During the transformation of energy some of the energy is lost in
the surrounding, that leads to increase in the disturbance of the
universe.
 Transformation of energy leads to decrease in the amount of energy
available, increasing in the disorder of the universe.
 Transformation of energy spontaneously converts matter from more
stable condition to less stable condition.
 Therefore, during any process the universe tends to move towards
disorder.
 This law applies to closed system. For example, this universe is a
closed, stable system, which has accumulated all its potential energy
it will ever have, it becomes increasingly disordered, with every
energy exchange, increases the amount of entropy.
 Gibb’s Free Energy

 Free energy is defined as the amount of energy available to

work in any system.
 When a bond is broken, heat and chemical bonding has a
significant effect.
 Heat increases kinetic energy of atom, thus makes it easier for
the atom to pull their electrons, increasing disorder, however
chemical bonding decreases this disorder, the net effect, the
amount of energy actually available to work, that is to break
the bond and form other chemical bond, is referred to as free
energy also called Gibbs free energy.
 When temperature, pressure and volume is constant, which is
usually the case in a living cell, the free energy is represented
by a symbol G.
 G=H-TS

 G=H-TS, where H is enthalpy, T is temperature and S is entropy. This is called as

Gibb’s free energy. The symbol delta is used to represent changes in free energy.

 Enthalpy is a measure of the total energy of a thermodynamic system. It includes

the internal energy, which is the energy required to create a system, and the amount
of energy required to make room for it by displacing its environment.

 Changes in free energy occur when a bond breaks as well as when the bond is
formed . The sign of Delta G is negative for all spontaneous processes and zero for
processes at equilibrium.

 For some reactions delta is positive which means the products of the reactions
contains more free energy than the reactants., the bond energy H is higher , or
the disorder S in the system lower. Such reaction do not proceed spontaneously
but require input of energy, thus called as endothermic reactions.
 EXOTHERMIC REACTIONS

 If the Delta sign is negative , the products of the

reaction contains less free energy than the reactants,
in other words reactants contain more energy
thus either the bond energy is lower or the disorder
is higher or both., such reaction tend to proceed
spontaneously that is they release energy , in other
words they are exothermic reactions.
 Thermodynamic and metabolism

 The fact that reaction occur spontaneously it doesn’t

mean that the reaction will start by itself.
 For any bond to be broken , or for any reaction to start ,
an initial input of energy is required, which will be
used to destabilize the chemical bonds and initiates the
reaction.
 This energy is called activation energy, however this
activation energy needs to be reduced.
 Biological catalyst are used to reduce activation
energy in biological system.

 Refer to fig 3.5 on page 118

 Coupled reactions:

 In cells, energy from catabolic reaction is re used to power anabolic

reactions. One of the example is the making and breaking of ATP.

 Cells uses ATP to drive endothermic reactions, mostly products contain

more energy than reactants; therefore these reactions do no occur
spontaneously, however, if the cleaving of ATP’s high energy bond, that is
the last phosphate releases more energy, than the other reactions
consumes, the two reactions can be coupled.

 This means the energy released by the hydrolysis of ATP can be used to
supply energy to endo`thermic reactions. Coupled together there is a net
release of energy and the reaction is exothermic.

 Therefore cells use exothermic reaction to combine ADP + PO4 to form

ATP, and then use the hydrolysis of ATP to provide energy for endothermic
reactions.
 Electron carriers.

 There are two main electron carriers in biological systems: NAD+ and
FADH. They get reduced and oxidised during the process of respiration and
photosynthesis helping in formation of ATP.

 Redox reactions are coupled reactions that play important role in the flow
of energy. The electrons that pass from one atom to another atom carries
energy with them, so the reduced form is always at a higher energy level
then the oxidised form, again energy depends on the energy level an
electron is occupying.

 These electrons are passed in the system by the use of electron carriers.
Electron carriers pick up these electrons from high energy rich compounds
and donate them to low energy compounds. They act just as carries but
are not consumed during this process.

 This process is used in ETC electron transport chain to manufacture ATP.