Blog Post #6

Our plant is still getting bigger and bigger, and it is getting bigger for a reason.  Mitosis is a form of cell division in which ordinary cells divide to form two identical cells.  All living things have cells that are undergoing mitosis as we speak.  Of course, since there are more cells then it adds biomass to the organism.

Our plant is making food for itself through the process of photosynthesis.  Photosynthesis occurs inside the chloroplast and uses water and carbon dioxide, a long with the energy of the sun to make sugars such as glucose.  The plant then uses these sugars to create energy.  Without the plant creating energy, it would not be able to continue living let alone add biomass.

And, arguably most important, there is cellular respiration.  Cellular respiration is how the plant actually converts those good for nothing sugar compounds into real, usable energy.  And like I said earlier, nothing would work without energy.

If a cell needed more of the enzymes PEPC and Rubisco, it would send a signal into the nucleus of the cell.  Once received the cell would make a copy of the DNA with instructions for these enzymes, and this copy is called mRNA.  The mRNA then zooms out of the nucleus and gets attached to a ribosome.  The ribosome can read the mRNA, but it still needs something to construct them.  That is where tRNA come a long.  They bring amino acids that fit into the codons of the mRNA.  If it fits, then it is put in place and eventually the enzyme will be created.