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My Lab on Cellular Respiration Essay

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Cellular respiration also known as oxidative metabolism is important to convert biochemical energy from nutrients in the cells of living organisms to useful energy known as adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Without cellular respiration living organisms would not be able to sustain life simply because nutrients would not metabolize in a productive manner. Cellular respirations was implemented in this laboratory by measuring the amount of O2 consumed/used by inserting respirometers that consisted of germinating and non-germinating peas into room temperature baths and low temperature baths. Evidently, in the respirometer that was placed in the room temperature bath and contained the germinating peas had the most O2 consumed. At 20 minutes a total …show more content…

As the seeds consume oxygen by respiration, the number of molecules of gas (n) in the respirometer decreases, likewise the change in the number of molecules is directly related to the amount of oxygen consumed. The movement of water into the pipette is a measure of the volume of gaseous O2 consumed by the respiring seeds. The dry or non-germinating peas lie dormant while the germinating peas do not. The temperature in relation to the dormancy or non- dormancy will affect the seeds in the following way. If the germinating peas are in favorable conditions such as “comfortable” weather then cellular respiration will obviously occur at a more expansive extent than in the dormant peas. Methods 1. A room temperature bath and an ice bath were prepared. The ice bath was set to be approximately 12°C while the room temp bath was set to be 21° C. 2. The volume of a handful of germinating peas was attained. The graduated tube was refilled with 25 mL of water. Dried peas were placed in the graduated cylinder and then glass beads were added to attain the volume equivalent to that of the germinating peas. 3. The procedure was repeated to prepare a second set of germinating peas, dry peas, dry peas plus beads and glass beads for use in the remaining respirometers. 4. All respirometers were labeled. 5. Respirometers 1-3 were placed in the ice bath and 4-6 were placed in the room temperature bath. A sling was placed so that the pipette tip was not submerged in the

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