human photosynthesis

Discussion in 'Biology & Genetics' started by Ethernos D Grace, Sep 25, 2017.

  1. Ethernos D Grace Registered Senior Member

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    are there scientist who would want to perform human experiments realated to photosynthesis ?
     
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  3. origin Heading towards oblivion Valued Senior Member

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  5. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Well... there is a sea slug that does it (one of the only known animals to obtain energy via direct photosynthesis if memory serves)
    http://blog.mbl.edu/2015/02/03/sea-...o-photosynthesize-like-a-plant-study-reports/

    That said... plants run at about 3 to 6% efficiency when performing photosynthesis:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthetic_efficiency

    By compare, a human is estimated to be around 20% efficient in terms of metabolic efficiency:
    https://www.quora.com/How-efficient-is-the-human-body-at-converting-food-energy-into-work-energy

    To take it further, and make a comparable figure, the human body needs about 80-100watts of energy just to keep itself alive (no physical activity, et al).
    https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/46788/how-efficient-is-the-human-body
    A plant, on the other hand, averages at the maximum roughly .7 Watts per square meter:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthetic_efficiency#Efficiencies_of_various_biofuel_crops

    So, if we made a person photosynthesize at the .7 Watts / m^2 maximum across the average human surface area:
    http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=39851
    So, call it 2 square meters... that gives us 1.4 watts. That gives us roughly 98.6 watts to make up, just to stay alive.

    Factor in clothing, shade cast by parts of the body casting shadow on other parts, places where the sun doesn't shine (unless you plan to stick a gro-lamp up your bum!), etc... and I think we can safely say that, even if we managed to up the efficiency of photosynthesis to current photovoltaic levels, which would give us about 44 watts, that a person simply could not produce enough energy via photosynthesis to survive... or, honestly, really make any difference in the amount of food they would have to eat to sustain themselves through even a mild jog.
     
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  7. Yazata Valued Senior Member

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    Sure. Several have won Nobel Prizes for it.

    http://ar.iiarjournals.org/content/36/3/1345.long

    The human body synthesizes several important chemicals using energy from sunlight, most notably vitamin D.

    What it doesn't do is synthesize sugars (food) like glucose C6H12O6 and long-chain polysaccharides like cellulose (plant body structural material) from CO2, H2O and light energy the way green plants do. (Plants actually feed themselves from water and air! Humans think that CO2 sucks, but plants love it.)
     
    Last edited: Sep 25, 2017
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  8. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    No one thinks CO2 sucks (with the possible exception of the handful of people who have been killed by CO2 asphyxiation, that is.) It has some pretty important uses. Like almost everything, there are some problems with it in large quantities, though.
     
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  9. timojin Valued Senior Member

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    You made an interesting analysis was it you or your dad. ?
     
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  10. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    ... Come again?

    Are you actually asking if my father penned that analysis?
     
  11. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    Like regulating our breathing.

    If CO2 in your system drops too low, your brain will tell your lungs to stop breathing.
     
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  12. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Which is why hyperventilating is so bad, if I'm not mistaken... And why the whole "breathing into a paper bag" thing came to be?
     
  13. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    And is also why oxygen starvation is NOT obvious. It does not make you gasp for air. What makes you gasp for air is excess CO2 in the blood.

    In the 1980s a shift supervisor at Shell Haven refinery died by putting his head into a column that was being purged with nitrogen. Very foolish thing to do - and there was a big inquest into safety procedures of course. He would have got no feeling of asphyxiation to warn him, because his lungs would have been able to get rid of CO2 as normal.

    When my wife was anaemic (due to chemotherapy) she became ill on the flight home from holiday: nauseous, light-headed, sweating, incontinent. It was oxygen starvation, due to the reduced cabin pressure at high altitude. But no gasping for air at all, just feeing lousy.
     
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  14. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Still waiting for some sort of explanation as to what the deuce you meant here...
     
  15. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Not sure if people are aware, but it's possible to become infected with a form of algae. I knew someone with green patches on the skin, doctors said it probably wasn't a problem unless they spread.
     
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  16. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    I find this highly implausible.
     
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  17. river

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    ethernos , your comment ?
     
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  18. Ethernos D Grace Registered Senior Member

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    hope she is well.....
     
  19. Ethernos D Grace Registered Senior Member

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    if we could use our hair for photosynthesis that be interesting ....
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 2, 2017
  20. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Hypoxia does indeed make you gasp for air. It's just not as obvious as hypercapnia.
     
  21. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Well, I mean, as the quick n dirty calculations I ran above point out... it would do nearly nothing in the face of our daily caloric burn.
     
  22. Ethernos D Grace Registered Senior Member

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    if there were possibility of increasing the efficiency.
     
  23. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    That would be a function of surface area.
    Imagine a 150 pound plant, with maybe one square foot of leaf surface area. That's way too small even for a sessile plant!
     

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