Question

Regrdless of the nature of the starting material, mitochondria become the focus for energy-providing macromolecules. Discuss this statement with provided examples.

Answer 1

Answer:

Mitochondria is called power house of the cell. It is responsible for production of energy containing molecules (ATP).

Respiration is a process in which glucose and oxygen molecules react to form co2,water and energy in a series of steps. It includes:

1)glycolysis

2)krebs cycle

3)electron transport system

Among these , glycolysis takes place in the cytoplasm , while krebs cycle and electron transport system takes place in mitochondria .

Glycolysis produces just 2 molecules of ATP per glucose molecule and transforms glucose into pyruvic acid.

Pyruvic acid is converted into acetyl coA which then enters krebs cycle. Krebs cycle produces NADH,and FADH2(energy containing molecules).

Most of the energy for living system is produced by these molecules (NADH , FADH2), this happens as follows:

These enter the electron transport system where electrons are passed through many complexes and finally accepted by oxygen. Due to this ,a proton gradient is maintained across the membrane , and yields ATP for proton transport across the membrane, with the help of ATP synthase. We get 3 ATP molecules for each NADH and 2 ATP molecules for each FADH2 molecule. This amount energy of energy is highly greater than that produced by glycolysis. Hence ,it can be said that maximum energy is formed inside mitochondria and a these are 'centres for energy production'.