Our bodies use the oxygen in the air to “burn” carbohydrates and make energy.
Our heart is a very clever pump that keeps our blood moving. The blood does many things, but one of them is that it carries the oxygen from the lungs to the cells and the carbon dioxide from “burning” the carbohydrates back to the lungs so we can breathe it out.
Why do we not live forever? There are lots of answers to that.
1. It is better for our children if we do not live forever – otherwise we would use up all the resources and our children would not get a go. This means that evolution says it is of benefit for us to die.
2. Many parts of our body do not renew themselves if they are damaged, so they eventually wear out (and we die).
3. There is also some special DNA on the end of our chromosomes (not my area, but I think the name is teleomeres) and we lose a few every time our DNA is copied; eventaully we run out and the copies are faulty.
Our bodies use the oxygen in the air to “burn” carbohydrates and make energy.
Our heart is a very clever pump that keeps our blood moving. The blood does many things, but one of them is that it carries the oxygen from the lungs to the cells and the carbon dioxide from “burning” the carbohydrates back to the lungs so we can breathe it out.
Why do we not live forever? There are lots of answers to that.
1. It is better for our children if we do not live forever – otherwise we would use up all the resources and our children would not get a go. This means that evolution says it is of benefit for us to die.
2. Many parts of our body do not renew themselves if they are damaged, so they eventually wear out (and we die).
3. There is also some special DNA on the end of our chromosomes (not my area, but I think the name is teleomeres) and we lose a few every time our DNA is copied; eventaully we run out and the copies are faulty.
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@Peter’s given you an awesome answer here @chickenbob1, nothing to add! (except that your profile pic is awesome!)
🙂
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