How is glucose converted to pyruvic acid?
This conversion, called glycolysis, involves a series of chemical reactions that convert glucose to pyruvic acid, In the process a small amount of energy is released and trapped for use by the cell. Glucose molecules are first broken in half, from six carbons to the three carbons that are present in pyruvic acid. No oxygen is used during glycolysis. Some bacteria and primitive organisms that depend highly on glycolysis can live in environments that do not have much oxygen. In higher animals, if oxygen is in short supply, the pyruvic acid may accumulate and convert into another three-carbon acid, called lactic acid. Lactic acid is what makes muscles sore when they are over-worked. What happens to the pyruvic acid? Pyruvic acid is eventually converted to carbon dioxide and water. This occurs through a cyclic chain of reactions, called the Krebs’ Cycle. Pyruvic acid takes the free hydrogen atoms and hands them off to other compounds. At several steps in the cycle, hydrogen and oxygen comb
