Now that we’ve learned how autotrophs like plants convert sunlight to sugars, let’s take a look at how all eukaryotes—which includes humans!—make use of those sugars.
In the process of photosynthesis, plants and other photosynthetic producers create glucose, which stores energy in its chemical bonds. Then, both plants and consumers, such as animals, undergo a series of metabolic pathways—collectively called cellular respiration. Cellular respiration extracts the energy from the bonds in glucose and converts it into a form that all living things can use.
