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  • BBC Wildlife Magazine

    How photosynthesis fuels life on Earth

    Aug 25, 2022 2 minutes

    PHOTOSYNTHESIS IS ONE OF nature’s most important processes. Powered by sunlight, it uses carbon dioxide to produce carbohydrates, the fuel for most life on Earth. The process also releases oxygen, vital for burning carbohydrates to generate energy through aerobic respiration.

    Which species can photosynthesise?

    Besides plants and microbes such as cyanobacteria, photosynthetic organisms also include algae – a diverse group that to the multicellular seaweeds that form kelp forests. In plant cells, photosynthesis occurs inside chloroplasts – descendants of cyanobacteria that were incorporated into plants over 2 billion years ago through endosymbiosis (see my column in the January 2022 issue).

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