When you eat a piece of bread, after absorving it in your small intestine, there will be a lot of glucose molecules roaming around your body. When each of them reach a cell, a fascinating process happens, where Glucose is turned to ATP, the fundamental unit of chemical energy in organisms. This process is called Cellular Respiration, and it consists in 4 steps:
- Glycolysis: In this step, Glucose molecules experience a series of chemical changes until they’re turned to Pyruvate, ATP is obtained and NAD+ is turned to NADH.
- Pyruvate Oxidation: The pyruvate molecules obtained in the last step are oxidized and turned into a coenzyme called Acetyl CoA.
- Krebs Cycle: You’ve heard about it, haven’t you? In this process, the coenzyme obtained attaches to a carbon molecule, and through some chemical reactions, ATP, NADH and FADH2 are produced.
- Oxidative Phosphorylation: The NADH and FADH2 electrons are used to produce even more ATP and water is formed.
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