The Biological Importance of Water

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The Biological Importance of Water

Biological Life as it is today, evolved mainly due to the dynamics of

water. Most scientists maintain that ‘were there is water, there life

may exist’. Hence, its significance as an indicator of life is used

when scientist study other planets of our solar system. Fundamentally,

the physical and chemical properties of water, interactively have

played and still play a major role in developing the five kingdoms:

Animalia, Plante, Fungi, Protoctista and Prokaryotae. Furthermore, the

importance of water can be seen at a biological, cellular, organism,

and environmental level. Each shall be discussed in turn.

In humans (and other animals), the process of digestion uses water to

hydrolyse the large organic molecules we eat, so that the products may

diffuse through the gut lumen into the blood system. The reactions in

digestion are effectively the reverse of condensation polymerisation

reactions in which smaller units (Monomers-e.g. glucose) are

polymerised to make larger chain molecules (polymers- e.g.starch),

leaving water as a by-product.

Water, being a polar molecule (see diagram below) dissolves other

polar substances including sugars, amino acids, oxygen, carbon dioxide

and ions. However, it does not dissolve non-polar substances such as

lipids. Consequently water is a good solvent and allows necessary

materials to be transported around the body for important processes’

such as respiration:

[IMAGE]C6H12O6 + O2 6CO2 + H2O

Whereas respiration in humans (and other animals) produces metabolic

water, plants (and some bacteria) use water in photosynthesis to

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Furthermore, since water has a high specific heat capacity, this means

that its temperature does not tend to fluctuate. Hence for aquatic

life their environment temperature is constant. This is crucial

especially when one consider the impact an irregular temperature can

have on the organism-eg-enzyme denaturing and therefore chemical

reactions halting.

In conclusion, it may be summarised that the importance of water can

be seen in near enough all aspects of biological life. Water, is

critical for human survival (and for other organisms). This can be

seen when one considers the fact that a person can survive on water

for a few days without food but vice-versa cannot (assuming the food

is free from water) survive. Put simply, without water Earth would be

a whole different place, lost of its present biological life.

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