Another Ice Age on its way?

[mperdue]

Some one needs to take biology over again in school Plants absorb the C and expell the O2 in Carbon Dioxide.

Only during the daytime; at night plants consume oxygen and produce carbon dioxide pretty much like animals do. You might want to do a search "Plant Respiration" to get the details.

Mario

 

[TNGTony]

Did you know animals and humans exhale 80% of the oxygen inhaled?
Did you know animals and humans do not exhale 10% of the CO2 inhaled?

So humans and animals inhale CO2 and Exhale O2.

*SOME* plants expel some of their CO2 during photosynthesis at night. Some do it during the day! The net intake of CO2 is much, much higher than the net output. The net output of O2 is much, much, much higher than the CO2.

See ya
Tony

 

[mperdue]

*SOME* plants expel some of their CO2 during photosynthesis at night. Some do it during the day! The net intake of CO2 is much, much higher than the net output. The net output of O2 is much, much, much higher than the CO2.

All plants use photosynthesis and respiration, not just *SOME* of them. Respiration in plants is necessary to provide for growth and metabolic energy, much the same as in all living organisms. I will grant you that plants produce more O2 than CO2 but they don't do it all of the time. Photosynthesis occurs during the day (hence the "photo" in the name) not in the dark. Respiration occurs all the time, even in the dark. It's easier to measure the effect in the dark because the O2 output from photosynthesis is not skewing the results.

 

[Stargazer]

So both plants and animals are inhaling the CO2 but it would probably take a heck of a lot of people and plants to take in the majority of the output from automobiles.

As bad as they say that things can get, comparing that to them trying to get humans to live on Mars, Earth would still be the closest thing to supporting life, I'd hope.

 

[long_time_DNC]

Terraforming Mars in any fashion is purely sci-fi...it's mass (hence it's gravity) isn't enough to sustain an atmosphere anywhere near something reasonable to live in.

Jade plants exhale their CO2 only at night. I think they're a pretty interesting plant.

 

[TNGTony]

All plants use photosynthesis and respiration, not just *SOME* of them. Respiration in plants is necessary to provide for growth and metabolic energy, much the same as in all living organisms. I will grant you that plants produce more O2 than CO2 but they don't do it all of the time. Photosynthesis occurs during the day (hence the "photo" in the name) not in the dark. Respiration occurs all the time, even in the dark. It's easier to measure the effect in the dark because the O2 output from photosynthesis is not skewing the results.

I understand the concept. I know exactly what the words mean. Some plans, especially desert plants have adapted to reverse their cycle in order to preserve water. I suggest you look into that.

However, plants are 100% responsible for ALL the oxygen and for absorbing CO2.

And earlier some one asked who would sink money into plants that absorb more CO2? That would be the entire agriculture industry in order to have faster growing or higher yielding crops

See ya
Tony

 

[TNGTony]

Inreresting article here. Among many much more interesting things here, it states that plants expel about 25% of the CO2 the take in in respiration. That is much lower than the percentage of inhaled oxygen humans exhale. So as I was saying NET plants take in oxygen and expel CO2. NET Humans inhale oxygen and exhale CO2.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/07/040723093305.htm
-----------------------
A biological process in plants, thought to be useless and even wasteful, has significant benefits and should not be engineered out -- particularly in the face of looming climate change, says a team of UC Davis researchers.

The researchers have found that the process, photorespiration, is necessary for healthy plant growth and if impaired could inhibit plant growth, particularly as atmospheric carbon dioxide rises as it is globally. Their findings are published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Over the past two hundred years, scientists have come to understand that plants are amazing biochemical factories that harness energy from sunlight to convert water and carbon dioxide into sugars that fuel the plant, while giving off oxygen.

Though elegantly simple in concept, this process, known as photosynthesis, is remarkably complex in detail. And for years, researchers have been puzzled by another process, photorespiration, which seems to have annoyingly associated with photosynthesis down the evolutionary pathway.

Photorespiration has appeared to be downright wasteful because it virtually undoes much of the work of photosynthesis by converting sugars in the plant back into carbon dioxide, water and energy.

Believing that photorespiration is a consequence of the higher levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide in long past ages, many scientists concluded that photorespiration is no longer necessary. Some have even set about to genetically engineer crop plants so that the activity of the enzyme that initiates both the light-independent reactions of photosynthesis and photorespiration would favor photosynthesis to a greater extent and minimize photorespiration.

The result, they have thought, would be more productive crop plants that make more efficient use of available resources.

But the new UC Davis study suggests that there is more to photorespiration than meets the eye and any attempts to minimize its activity in crop plants would be ill advised.

"Photorespiration is a mysterious process that under present condition dissipates about 25 percent of the energy that a plant captures during photosynthesis," said Arnold Bloom, a professor in UC Davis' vegetable crops department and lead researcher on the study. "But our research has shown that photorespiration enables the plant to take inorganic nitrogen in the form of nitrate and convert it into a form that is useful for plant growth."

The UC Davis team used two different methods to demonstrate in both wheat and Arabidopsis, a common research plant, that when plants are exposed to elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide or low levels of oxygen -- both conditions that inhibit photorespiration -- nitrate assimilation in the plant's shoot slows down. Eventually, a shortage of nitrogen will curtail the plant's growth.

"This explains why many plants are unable to sustain rapid growth when there is a significant increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide," said Bloom. "And, as we anticipate a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide associated with global climate change by the end of this century, our results suggest that it would not be wise to decrease photorespiration in crop plants."

The UC Davis study was supported by the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and an Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development Fund fellowship.

 

[Stargazer]

When it is said that researches find that carbon dioxide could inhibit plant growth, then more plants alone would help in that it would lower the carbon dioxide count and increase the oxygen count helping the plants, right?

There are different angles to global warming that most people do not think about such as what is being said in this thread and people thinking that electric cars would solve the problem when it would cause just as much if not more problems by the energy used to power those electric cars coming from the power plants instead of the electric cars as I read in another thread.

 

[navychop]

Mars had an atmosphere long ago, and might have one again some day. Rain and waterways are believed to have existed on Mars (not yet proven, although it seems ice exists for sure), and that is only possible in an atmosphere. Yes, gravity helps keep the atmosphere, but other sources of gases can replenish what is lost.

Electric cars would reduce pollution even if from conventional (50% coal) power plants, due to greater efficiencies in production and centralized pollution control. Moreso if from nuclear.