Under My Skin

Seriously, I think I am going nuts. On this humid night, when everyone are dozing their heads off in a fully air-cond room, I am forced to stick my butt on a chair, and bury my head in a pile of Biology books.

So, I told myself, never mind. My mission today, is to finish cellular respiration. And after that, I can just close my eyes and dream about paradise.


The first part was the aerobic respiration and anaerobic respiration crap that I had learnt during SPM. So 5 minutes, that part, done. The next thing was bedazzling. It was glycolysis. (OK, I never paid attention during class.) I have no idea what it was. It's something like a flow chart with a lot of branches.

See I am so hardworking, I did my own notes.

Glycolysis is the process of converting glucose to pyruvic acid. And pyruvic acid will be further decarboxylased and oxidised to form ATP, NADH, FADH2, and carbon dioxide. And ATP will go to the electron transport system and it will produce water and oxygen as end products.


My own notes for Kreb's cycle. The cycle which involves the conversion of Pyruvic acid(3 Carbon compound)to Citric Acid(6C), then isocitric acid(6C) and then further oxidative decarboxylation to alpha-ketoglutaric acid(5C), succinic acid(4C), Fumaric Acid(4C), Malic Acid(4C), Oxaloacetic Acid(4C) as a complete cycle, catalysed by lots of enzymes such as pyruvate dehydrogenase, isocitrase dehydrogenase, fumarase...etc etc...

Thanks to Mr. Krebs.

He got a Nobel Prize for discovering this mechanism.

Next is the electron transport system.
The diagram from my textbook. This, I have not read yet because all those circles and cycles are driving me up the wall.


So, in the end, what we get is energy, CO2 and water. I remember Michelle flinging her hands:"That's it? After one month of boring classes, what we got is just 3 end products?"

Haha...See, God create wonders. Every cell in our body has mitochondria(plural of mitochondrion), which means we have zillions of mitochondria performing the same job everyday. Every cell in our body requires energy. Brain cells need energy for us to think. Muscle cells need them for locomotion. Nerve cells need energy for generating impulses. If any cell in our body refuses to undergo cellular respiration, our entire body will shut down, hence, we get sick, or worse, paralysed.

One cell to build a tissue. One tissue to build an organ. One organ to maintain a system. One system to sustain an organism.

Isn't life amazing?