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Chemistry makes life possible!
Chemistry of life

Life is a chemical process!
An understanding of life requires an understanding of the chemical basis of life. Have you ever wondered why leaves turn colors in the fall and how a battery generates electricity and why ice melts and water evaporates ? Why keeping foods cold slows their spoilage and how our bodies use food to maintain life ? Chemistry supplies answers to these questions and countless others like them. One of the joys of learning chemistry is seeing how chemical principles operate in all aspects of our lives, from everyday activities like lighting a match to more far-reaching matters like the development of drugs to cure cancer. Before traveling to an unfamiliar city, you might take a look at a map to get some sense of where you are heading. In the same way, because the term "chemistry" may be familiar to you, but it's useful to get a general idea of what lies ahead before you embark on your journey which exactly relate to the basic chemical factors in our life.

The chemical basis of life involves in many areas: understanding our body, improvement of health care, conservation of natural resources, and protection of the environment, provision of our everyday needs for food, clothing, and shelter. Studying the basis of chemistry, we have discovered pharmaceutical chemicals that enhance our health and prolong our lives. We have increased food production through the development of fertilizers and pesticides. We have developed plastics and other materials that are used in almost every facet of our lives.

Matter is everything around you!
What is matter?

The world around us is made of many physical substances such as the grass or concrete on which we walk, the water we drink, and even air we breathe. All of these substances that make up our world are called matter. In basic terms, matter is anything that takes up space and has mass. All forms of matter are made up of tiny particles called atoms. Our body, the clothes we are wearing, and the air we are breathing are all samples of matter. Of course, not all forms of matter are so common or so familiar. Nevertheless, countless experiments have shown that the tremendous variety of matter in our world is due to combinations of only about 100 very basic or elementary substances, called elements. The important foundation for any biologist who wants to understand molecular mechanisms underlying all life are based on understanding following observations: Six elements - carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur - make up 96% of all molecules of life. The remaining elements constitute essential minerals. The body is made from atoms of elements. They are combined to form molecules such as proteins, carbohydrates, lipids and nucleic acids (DNA and RNA).

Chemical reactions occur when two or more molecules interact and the molecules change.
Changes in the world!

Every change in the observable world-from boiling water to the changes that occur as our bodies combat invading viruses, the changes in the seasons has its basis in the unobservable world of atoms and molecules. Thus, as we proceed with our study of chemistry, we will find ourselves thinking in two realms, the realm of ordinary-sized objects (the microscopic realm; macro = large) and the submicroscopic realm of atoms. We make our observations in the macroscopic world of our everyday senses in the laboratory and in our surroundings. In order to understand that world, however, we must visualize how atoms behave.

Trillions of chemical reactions happen simultaneously in the body. They drive the processes that keep a human body 'alive'. Collectively, they are known as metabolism. Metabolism is made up of numerous metabolic pathways. A metabolic pathway is a sequence of chemical reactions that follow a set of 'instructions' contained in the body's DNA. Chemical compounds enter the body. They are breathed in, swallowed or (more rarely) absorbed through the skin.

An important chemical reaction in our bloodstream
Chemistry is everywhere!

Everything is a chemical because everything is made of matter. Our body is made of chemicals. Everything we hear, see, smell, taste, and touch involves chemistry and chemicals (matter). Almost all the life activities such as - hearing, seeing, tasting, and touching all involve intricate series of chemical reactions and interactions in your body.

Our body: Our body is mostly water which is hydrogen and oxygen. Water is the most abundant substance in living systems, making up 70% or more of the weight of most organisms. For instance, biological molecules are made of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), oxygen (O), nitrogen (N), sulfur (S) and phosphor (P) plus many ionic species (e.g. sodium, potassium, chloride, calcium, magnesium, iron, copper, cobalt, manganese, selenium). Our body has molecules that include proteins, nucleic acids, carbohydrates and lipids which are the intricate machines of chemicals. The properties they convey are enzymatic activity (metabolism), genetic inheritance, reproduction, cell growth, energy storage and conversion, signaling and adhesion, and interaction with the environment. All living organisms use the same four types of macromolecules for cellular metabolism and reproduction. Together, they illustrate the commonalities of life on earth. The way they are used in different forms and combinations explains today's variety or biodiversity. Both aspects, sameness and variety, are the result of biological evolution.

Dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin, and Endorphins are responsible for our happiness!
Biochemical phenomena that occur in natural places!
Our emotions

Human emotions are the result of combination of interrelationship between the intricate neuron network and the hormones of our body and are governed by a complex mixture of chemicals and electricity generated by them. The human brain weighs over a kilogram (2.2 pounds) and has an estimated 86 billion neurons. Signals are transmitted along each nerve electrically, by gradients of charged ions, and each neuron makes hundreds of connections to those around it. At each of the 300 trillion synapses in the human brain, chemicals known as neurotransmitters relay messages from one nerve to another. Each neurotransmitter has a set of corresponding receptors, which can be activatory or inhibitory, helping nerves to fire, or preventing them from working. This enormous chemical and electrical network provides the complexity that enables us to feel emotion, from the all-consuming addiction of love, to the raw devastation of grief.

Our environment: Chemistry is not limited to beakers and laboratories. It is all around us, and the better we know chemistry, the better we know our world. Hold up a flower of your choice and take a good look at it. You will find the colors, smell, texture, and the symmetry of it all to be beautiful. You might even notice things that others miss. Just to get it out of the way, matter is anything that occupies space. It includes both natural substances and man made or synthetic materials. Importantly, all matter is composed of microscopic particles (atoms and molecules). It, however, is the arrangement and interactions of particles in a substance that is interesting. It is because of the countless ways in which particles can arrange themselves in that we have such a great variety of matter.

Be it a flower or a metal, cell or cosmetics, battery or an apple. The infinite variety in nature and the world is due to the transformations that take place at the molecular level. It is these that distinguish us from wood, enable a firefly to emit light, and cause the flavors in a chocolate to be so enticing. The basics are simple but the complexity of molecules that can be built in accordance with simple rules is astonishing. Amazing, isn't it! And so it is with chemistry, understanding the basic properties of matter and learning how to predict and explain how they change when they react to form new substances is what chemistry and chemists are all about.

References:

  • Brown LeMay Bursten – Chemistry - The Central Science – 8th edition
  • http://www.whatislife.com/principles/principles03-chemistry.html
  • https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/everything-you-need-to-know-about-happiness-science-a6792031.html
  • https://www.simply.science/chemistry/matter-is-everything