A question for the plant ed people to ponder that was posed on the biolab at hubca
p chat!
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Date: Wed, 7 Jan 1998 17:24:01 -0500 (EST)
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From: barbara beitch <brbeitch at hamdenhall.org>
To: Multiple recipients of list <biolab at hubcap.clemson.edu>
Subject: photorespiration - why?
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Biolabbers -
Boy, I'm full of questions today. Probably because I'm so glad that
you're all back.
Each year when I teach photorespiration, I tear my hair out trying to
find out if anyone has a great hypothesis about any possible adaptive
value of this pathway. Yeah, yeah, I know that it generates carbon
dioxide, and results in rubisco again fixing it and the Calvin cycle
resuming. But at what cost?!? Doesn't the organism get anything else
out of it? Are some of the amino acids formed in the process used in
protein synthesis, or something like that? I've searched the Net,
searched my plant physiology books, and can find nothing that I'm happy
with.
Any ideas out there?
-Puzzled,
Barb Beitch
