Breathing is a universal property of all living things that exist on Earth. The main property of the respiratory process is the absorption of oxygen, which interacts with organic compounds of living tissues with the formation of water and carbon dioxide. The respiration of plants is accompanied by the absorption of water by the plant organism, and carbon dioxide is released into the surrounding space of the plant.
When breathing, a plant spends organic matter to release energy , this process is the opposite of photosynthesis, when nutrients accumulate in plant tissues . In the daytime hours, almost all plants produce oxygen, but in their cells the respiratory process also takes place, but it is less intense. At night, plant respiration occurs more actively, unlike photosynthesis, which, without access to light, stops.
The act of respiration in plants
The plant cell and, accordingly, the whole plant as a whole, exists subject to a continuous influx of plastic substances and energy. The act of breathing, from a chemical point of view, consists of numerous links in a chain of related redox reactions that occur between cellular organelles and are accompanied by the breakdown of substances. The energy released during cleavage is used to power the plant.
The external respiration of plants is the gas exchange between the plant organism itself and the external environment through the stomata of leaves or lentils in tree trunks. The respiratory organs of more highly organized plants are leaves, tree trunks, stems, each of the algae cells.
Tissue breath
For cellular respiration in plants, special cell structures — mitochondria — are responsible. These plant cell organelles are significantly different from those in animals, which can be explained by the characteristics of the plant vital activity (lifestyle - attached, change in metabolism due to changing environmental conditions).
Therefore, the respiration of plants is accompanied by additional ways of oxidizing organic elements, in which alternative enzymes are produced. The breathing algorithm can be represented schematically as an oxidation reaction to sugars and carbon dioxide, due to the absorption of oxygen. This is accompanied by the release of heat, which is clearly visible when flowers bloom and seed germination. The respiration of plants is not only the supply of energy for the growth and further development of the plant. The role of breathing is very important. At the intermediate stages of the respiratory process, organic compounds are formed , which are then used in the metabolism, for example, pentose and organic acids. Respiration and photosynthesis, despite being opposite in nature, are interconnected, as they serve as sources of energy carriers such as NADP-H, ATP and metabolites in the cell. Water, which is released during breathing, in dry conditions saves the plant from dehydration. Moreover, if the process is too intense, excessive release of respiratory energy in the form of heat can cause the loss of dry matter of a living cell.