3 major themes

Three major themes that I have identified in this course are: the storage mechanisms in metabolism/glycolysis, proteins and their functions, and thermodynamics.

I learned about glycolysis in biology, but it the knowledge about it never was very indepth. In biochemistry I have not only learned about glycolysis, but I have gained an enormous amount of insight into what it does, how it does it, the major control points in it, the major enzymes involved in it, and the major outputs by it. I also learned about the "reverse" process of it, gluconeogenesis. I had previously learned about proteins, in both biology, chemistry, and nutrition. I had learned how proteins were made up of amino acids, were a key nutrient, and that they body used them alot in certain processes. Now throughout this biochemistry course I see how proteins do what they do, and just how many processes in the body they control. I know understand how proteins work as enzymes and the mechanisms they use in the body, for example- having allosteric control. Thermodynamics is also a term I learned about in chemistry. I had known that were spontaneous reactions, and non spontaneous reactions but I didn't realize how much it had to with energy, and how that ties into our bodies metabolism. I know know that spontaneous reactions take place without outside intervention or energy, these are exergonic, and an example of that would be the aerobic metabolism of glucose. I also learned that non-spontaneous reactions are endergonic, and example is the phosphorylation of ADP, it's how metabolic processes provide energy. I was also able to tie in my knowledge of oxidation and reduction that I learned in chemistry to metabolism even further when I learned about thermodynamics in biochemistry. I learned that in metabolism both catabolism and anabolism take place. In catabolism, there is a breakdown, energy is released, and this is an oxidative process. I also learned that anabolism is the building up of things, it requires energy, so it is non-spontaneous, and is a  reductive process, it involves biosynthesis.

Glucose and how energy is used in the body.

If I had a friend who wanted to know how glucose enters the body, and how they create energy from that glucose I'd make it very easy for them. I would explain that when they eat glucose (sugars), if their body is in need of ATP, for example if they are exercising, it will enter the glycolytic pathway. But if they don't need to make any more ATP,  the body will store glycogen, the by product of gluconeogenesis , for later use. I would explain that glycogen is the branched form of glucose that gets stored in the muscles and liver. Once those glycogen stores are full the body takes the rest of the glucose and it gets stored as fast.

 Later, when they need to create energy from that stored glucose they are four initial energy sources available to the muscle of the  person exercising- the body first uses up its creatine phosphate stores in the first sixty seconds. Then, after that the body uses up the glucose from the glycogen of the muscles stores, which is initially  consumed by anaerobic metabolism. Next the body uses the glucose from the liver, from both its glycogen stores and the gluconeogenesis from lactic acid produced in the muscle, again initially consumed by anaerobic metabolism. Time wise, their is about ten to thirty minutes worth of glycogen stored in the muscle cells. So glycogen loading can be a key component if the person is training for a marathon or something that involves high intensity training.

It is important to understand how glucose is stored and how energy is created in the body, especially when you are an athlete. I have learned so much about the body by taking this biochemistry course, not just in the term of biological molecules and how they are processed and used, but from how I can use this knowledge on a daily basis to make my life, and healthy, that much better.