Bioenergetics is the study of energy flow and transformation in biological systems, focusing on how cells acquire, convert, store, and utilize energy to drive metabolic processes. It encompasses the thermodynamics and kinetics of biochemical reactions, including ATP synthesis, redox reactions, and proton motive force generation across biological membranes. Central topics include oxidative phosphorylation, photosynthetic energy conversion, substrate-level phosphorylation, and the coupling of catabolic and anabolic pathways. Bioenergetics provides quantitative frameworks (e.g., Gibbs free energy, redox potentials, chemiosmotic theory) to analyze how cellular structures such as mitochondria, chloroplasts, and bacterial membranes support energy transduction and maintain nonequilibrium steady states required for life.
An international study by scientists at the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares Carlos III (CNIC) and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) has identified a fundamental mechanism that regulates ...
Cell & Microbiology
5 hours ago
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New research finds that birds can use lactate, often thought of as a metabolic waste product, as a cellular fuel that aids in rapid recovery from a harmful state that impairs oxygen delivery. Hemoglobin, the protein that ...
Ecology
Jul 7, 2026
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A new analysis sheds light on the most likely route for the Carthaginian general's famous crossing of the Alps. The study, led by the University of Oxford and iDiv/Friedrich Schiller University Jena, reveals that the Col ...
Plants & Animals
Jul 6, 2026
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In a study published in Nature Communications, researchers at Karolinska Institutet have mapped key steps in the assembly of the mitochondrial ribosome, offering new clues to how defects in this process can lead to disease.
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 24, 2026
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Researchers at the University of Surrey have identified a protein that acts as a control switch, preventing Mycobacterium tuberculosis from accessing the energy sources it needs to survive. The discovery points to a specific ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 22, 2026
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With the release of "Disclosure Day," Steven Spielberg's new film about aliens, a question as old as science fiction itself resurfaces: If aliens were to arrive on Earth, would they come to conquer us, to study us ... or ...
Astrobiology
Jun 21, 2026
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When living cells grow, divide or respond to drugs, they give off tiny amounts of heat that offer information about what the cells are doing. But because these heat signals are so vanishingly small, they have traditionally ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 16, 2026
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A new study finds that plants respond to injury by actively redirecting sugars to damaged tissues, helping fuel the regeneration process. Using a fluorescent sensor to track sugar movement in living plants, researchers have ...
Plants & Animals
Jun 15, 2026
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Researchers at the University of Greifswald have discovered a new mechanism by which bacteria such as Bacillus subtilis can regulate the production of the central metabolic molecule acetyl coenzyme A (Acetyl-CoA). Acetyl-CoA, ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 11, 2026
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9
For decades, biologists assumed a cell's energy simply diffused to wherever it was needed. It turns out the most important destination of all has a private delivery line.
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 10, 2026
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