In: Biology
Imagine an herbicide inhibited the proton (H+) pumps in the plasma membrane of the cells in a plant stem. How would that affect the activity of the enzymes involved in cell growth? What would be the specific consequence for the cell?
the proton pump uses energy to transport protons from the matrix of the mitochondrion to the inter-membrane space. It is an active pump that generates a proton concentration gradient across the inner mitochondrial membrane because there are more protons outside the matrix than inside. All this is utilized to synthesize ATP from ADP and Pi. Thus the whole concept is to generate energy.
Now if the activity of this pump is blocked major chunk of ATP produced will be lost. This ATP is used by many reactions taking place inside the cells like various anabolic reactions which are required for growth. thus ATP powers many growth reactions like Active Transport, Secretion, Endocytosis, Synthesis and Replication of DNA and Movement. Thus all these reactions will suffer in the absence of proton pump