changed the world.
He calls the photosynthetic process âalmost magicalâ. His description gives a flavour of the magic involved: âWhen one, very specific chlorophyll molecule embedded in a reaction center absorbs the energy from a photon, the energy of the light particle can push an electron off the chlorophyll molecule. For about a billionth of a second, the chlorophyll molecule becomes positively charged.â The electron âholeâ in the chlorophyll molecule is in turn filled by an electron from âa quartet of manganese [the chemical element] atoms held in a special arrangement on one side of a membraneâ. The electron âholeâ thus formed in the manganese quartet is filled with electrons from a water molecule. This causes the water molecule to fall apart, creating free oxygen.
Photosynthesis permits a local and temporary reversal of the second law of thermodynamics â the creation of order out of disorder. Magical indeed, but in early 2014 photosynthesis was revealed to be even more magical than Falkowskiâs book allows. Physicists based in the United Kingdom demonstrated that quantum mechanics plays a vital part in the photosynthetic process, by helping to transport the energy it captures efficiently, in a wavelike manner. 1
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If chemistry is not your cup of tea, Falkowski offers an alternative way of thinking about how photosynthesis works â as a microscopic sound and light show. The light is of course the photon that energises the performance, while the sound is provided by the chlorophyll molecule, which flexes with an audible âpopâ when it loses its electron. The phenomenon was discovered by Alexander Graham Bell, who in 1880 used what he called the âphotoacoustic effectâ to make a device he named the photophone. Bell used the photophone to transmit a wireless voice telephone message 700 feet, and considered it to be his greatest invention. And perhaps it was, since it was the precursor of fibre optic communication.
The way that the sophisticated nanomachines Falkowski describes became incorporated into a single complex cell, such as those our bodies consist of, is so incredible that it reads like a fairytale. Using a system known as âquorum sensingâ, microbes can communicate, and they use this ability to switch on and off various functions within their own populations and within ecosystems composed of different microbe species. Quorum sensing can even operate when one microbe swallows another, as happened over a billion years ago when a larger cell began to communicate with a smaller one that it had ingested. Quorum sensing permitted the potential food item to live inside its host instead of being digested. Then it allowed genes to switch on and off in ways that benefited the new chimeric, or genetically mixed, entity. The two genomes co-existing in the chimera even managed to exchange some genes, further enabling it to operate as a competent whole. As a result of these changes, the organism that was swallowed was transformed into a mitochondria, and began supplying ATP to the first eukaryotic cell â that is, a cell containing a nucleus and other complicated structures.
As impossible as this process sounds, it was followed by an even more outlandish occurrence. Somehow the newly created binary organism swallowed yet another entity â a kind of bacteria that could photosynthesise. Again the ingested entity lived on inside the cell, using quorum sensing to somehow synchronise its âalmost magicalâ nanomachinery with those of the binary organism. This newly constituted âtrinity organismâ became the photosynthetic ancestor of every plant on earth.
Microbes control the Earth, Falkowski tells us. They created it in its present form, and maintain it in its current state by creating a global electron marketplace that we call the biosphere. Falkowski argues that we can conceive of our world as a great, unitary
He calls the photosynthetic process âalmost magicalâ. His description gives a flavour of the magic involved: âWhen one, very specific chlorophyll molecule embedded in a reaction center absorbs the energy from a photon, the energy of the light particle can push an electron off the chlorophyll molecule. For about a billionth of a second, the chlorophyll molecule becomes positively charged.â The electron âholeâ in the chlorophyll molecule is in turn filled by an electron from âa quartet of manganese [the chemical element] atoms held in a special arrangement on one side of a membraneâ. The electron âholeâ thus formed in the manganese quartet is filled with electrons from a water molecule. This causes the water molecule to fall apart, creating free oxygen.
Photosynthesis permits a local and temporary reversal of the second law of thermodynamics â the creation of order out of disorder. Magical indeed, but in early 2014 photosynthesis was revealed to be even more magical than Falkowskiâs book allows. Physicists based in the United Kingdom demonstrated that quantum mechanics plays a vital part in the photosynthetic process, by helping to transport the energy it captures efficiently, in a wavelike manner. 1
*
If chemistry is not your cup of tea, Falkowski offers an alternative way of thinking about how photosynthesis works â as a microscopic sound and light show. The light is of course the photon that energises the performance, while the sound is provided by the chlorophyll molecule, which flexes with an audible âpopâ when it loses its electron. The phenomenon was discovered by Alexander Graham Bell, who in 1880 used what he called the âphotoacoustic effectâ to make a device he named the photophone. Bell used the photophone to transmit a wireless voice telephone message 700 feet, and considered it to be his greatest invention. And perhaps it was, since it was the precursor of fibre optic communication.
The way that the sophisticated nanomachines Falkowski describes became incorporated into a single complex cell, such as those our bodies consist of, is so incredible that it reads like a fairytale. Using a system known as âquorum sensingâ, microbes can communicate, and they use this ability to switch on and off various functions within their own populations and within ecosystems composed of different microbe species. Quorum sensing can even operate when one microbe swallows another, as happened over a billion years ago when a larger cell began to communicate with a smaller one that it had ingested. Quorum sensing permitted the potential food item to live inside its host instead of being digested. Then it allowed genes to switch on and off in ways that benefited the new chimeric, or genetically mixed, entity. The two genomes co-existing in the chimera even managed to exchange some genes, further enabling it to operate as a competent whole. As a result of these changes, the organism that was swallowed was transformed into a mitochondria, and began supplying ATP to the first eukaryotic cell â that is, a cell containing a nucleus and other complicated structures.
As impossible as this process sounds, it was followed by an even more outlandish occurrence. Somehow the newly created binary organism swallowed yet another entity â a kind of bacteria that could photosynthesise. Again the ingested entity lived on inside the cell, using quorum sensing to somehow synchronise its âalmost magicalâ nanomachinery with those of the binary organism. This newly constituted âtrinity organismâ became the photosynthetic ancestor of every plant on earth.
Microbes control the Earth, Falkowski tells us. They created it in its present form, and maintain it in its current state by creating a global electron marketplace that we call the biosphere. Falkowski argues that we can conceive of our world as a great, unitary
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