Energy comes in many forms. The energy to get up and go to work in the morning, the energy used to run the coffee pot, the energy obtained from a dam, fueling our constant need for electricity, even the energy which is seen in the desert night sky when a lightening storm goes racing across a low mesa. Nonetheless, energy is a type of currency seen and used by everyone. It's seen in a growing child, in a pregnant girl, in a marathon runner in their last leg of a race. We need it to grow up, for our bones to lengthen, and for our minds to flourish and expand. Energy is all around us in many forms; mechanical, thermal, electric, electromagnetic, chemical, nuclear, sound and lastly, but not least, a new term we all need to become familiar with and understand, bioenergetics.
Bioenergetics is a term I recently stumbled upon, but it makes sense. It is a rapidly increaseing field of study and I have been able to break it down in laymen's terms as to make sense of it, for you, and for me as well.
So, here goes : The human body is a living organism which requires external forces to run it, and those forces are food, water and oxygen. This field of biochemistry's main focus is the body and how it is able to metabolize and utilize these said products. So, if you eat, say, a piece of pie, all the little food molecules are then broken down by the gastrointestinal tract, in fact starting in your mouth. But, this delicious flakey pie and its moist unctuous filling must have a little sugar right? But, here is a better question, what is sugar exactly? Well, table sugar, or the sugar used to sweeten your morning coffee, or in this case, pie filling, is also known as sucrose. Sucrose is made of two molecules, the monosaccharides glucose and fructose, which bond together forming the disaccharide we love and use abundantly. The glucose component of the sugar breaks down into pyruvate, by a process which we know as glycolysis. Glycolysis is one of the pathways which converts sugar to energy, essentially. This energy is to be used in the body, or if not used immediately stored, or used somewhere else in the body in another reaction. But how do we get this energy? What does this energy look like? Well, through a series of reactions, the glycolysis pathway releases high energy compounds. These high energy products released by the action of this pathway are ATP and NADH, also known as the "molecular units of currency". This is just a small fraction of the story....
Getting dizzy? I know I did when I first began to dissect and disassemble the tangled mess that is human digestion.
I'm sure it's obvious to you now that there are numerous steps in the process of metabolism. Here, with our pie example, there are hundreds of other reactions which take place to break down the many different food molecules present. The fat from the buttery crust, the carbohydrates from the sweet fruit inside, the protein from the flour used to hold it all together, etc. etc. But lets keep it simple. For now, we eat food, the body breaks it down, which requires enzymes, catalyses, acids, mucus and hormones to work in concert with each other, so that we get the compounds needed to not only run the body but also to break down foods we eat.
Amazing isn't it? That the energy the body uses to stimulate your muscles, your brain and everything in between, is fueled by those treats and sweets we love so much?
It's clear that certain foods contain a higher amount of energy per bite, but as I stated in the C post, calories or kilocalories are a unit of energy. Think on this point for a second; think about the foods you eat regularly and think about which foods make you more hungry after you eat them? High sugar ones right? Put the Skittles down, throw out the Coca-cola, yes I know, but, you really need to get rid of the Ben and Jerry's Fish Food Ice Cream, and think. Doesn't it make you question, as you're reaching for that third soda, if you had just eaten something that filled you up, gave you energy, and left you without the distraction of hunger at the end of the day, wouldn't you feel better? Your body will use energy it has stored, instead of the energy eaten! i.e. the loss of pounds! Fabulous. The simple fact is, we need to eat to survive, so choose that energy source wisely. You wouldn't want to put bad fuel in your car, why put it in your body.
I'm going to give you a simple math problem. When I saw this I realized how simple it can be :
1 Pound = 3,500 calories.
So, if an individual cut 500 calories out the their diet daily for a week that would mean that....
500 kcals x 7 days in a week = 3,500 calories, or the loss of 1 pound!
Amazing, right? Just remember, that 1 pound isn't going to be just the muffin tops of the belly fat which we desperately hate. But hey, it is a step in the right direction, and lets try to do it without soda, okay?
So, here goes : The human body is a living organism which requires external forces to run it, and those forces are food, water and oxygen. This field of biochemistry's main focus is the body and how it is able to metabolize and utilize these said products. So, if you eat, say, a piece of pie, all the little food molecules are then broken down by the gastrointestinal tract, in fact starting in your mouth. But, this delicious flakey pie and its moist unctuous filling must have a little sugar right? But, here is a better question, what is sugar exactly? Well, table sugar, or the sugar used to sweeten your morning coffee, or in this case, pie filling, is also known as sucrose. Sucrose is made of two molecules, the monosaccharides glucose and fructose, which bond together forming the disaccharide we love and use abundantly. The glucose component of the sugar breaks down into pyruvate, by a process which we know as glycolysis. Glycolysis is one of the pathways which converts sugar to energy, essentially. This energy is to be used in the body, or if not used immediately stored, or used somewhere else in the body in another reaction. But how do we get this energy? What does this energy look like? Well, through a series of reactions, the glycolysis pathway releases high energy compounds. These high energy products released by the action of this pathway are ATP and NADH, also known as the "molecular units of currency". This is just a small fraction of the story....
Getting dizzy? I know I did when I first began to dissect and disassemble the tangled mess that is human digestion.
I'm sure it's obvious to you now that there are numerous steps in the process of metabolism. Here, with our pie example, there are hundreds of other reactions which take place to break down the many different food molecules present. The fat from the buttery crust, the carbohydrates from the sweet fruit inside, the protein from the flour used to hold it all together, etc. etc. But lets keep it simple. For now, we eat food, the body breaks it down, which requires enzymes, catalyses, acids, mucus and hormones to work in concert with each other, so that we get the compounds needed to not only run the body but also to break down foods we eat.
Amazing isn't it? That the energy the body uses to stimulate your muscles, your brain and everything in between, is fueled by those treats and sweets we love so much?
It's clear that certain foods contain a higher amount of energy per bite, but as I stated in the C post, calories or kilocalories are a unit of energy. Think on this point for a second; think about the foods you eat regularly and think about which foods make you more hungry after you eat them? High sugar ones right? Put the Skittles down, throw out the Coca-cola, yes I know, but, you really need to get rid of the Ben and Jerry's Fish Food Ice Cream, and think. Doesn't it make you question, as you're reaching for that third soda, if you had just eaten something that filled you up, gave you energy, and left you without the distraction of hunger at the end of the day, wouldn't you feel better? Your body will use energy it has stored, instead of the energy eaten! i.e. the loss of pounds! Fabulous. The simple fact is, we need to eat to survive, so choose that energy source wisely. You wouldn't want to put bad fuel in your car, why put it in your body.
I'm going to give you a simple math problem. When I saw this I realized how simple it can be :
1 Pound = 3,500 calories.
So, if an individual cut 500 calories out the their diet daily for a week that would mean that....
500 kcals x 7 days in a week = 3,500 calories, or the loss of 1 pound!
Amazing, right? Just remember, that 1 pound isn't going to be just the muffin tops of the belly fat which we desperately hate. But hey, it is a step in the right direction, and lets try to do it without soda, okay?
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