“Hacking” Photosynthesis

Humans are hacking the system of photosynthesis by trying to replicate it. It is said that by 2050, there will be approximately 9.7 billion people on this warming planet. This is a problem because, with that many people, there will be a stretch demand for food and energy. A specific group of scientists called RIPE is trying to “hack” photosynthesis in ways that can yield crops. A plant biochemist named Amanda Cavanaugh works with RIPE and she focuses on an enzyme called Rubisco and this enzyme has a big impact on photosynthesis. Rubisco is what grabs carbon dioxide out of the air and helps convert it to sugar, or glucose. That’s the process that makes plants into an energy-conversion system that fuels the growth of animals. When Rubisco makes those mistaken compounds, a plant gets rid of them. It does that by transporting these unwanted chemicals to three different structures within the plant cell (Patterson). Cavanaugh and her colleagues saw this “recycling” process as wasting a plant’s precious energy and time. “We wondered if there was a way to speed that up,” she says. Speeding up or “hacking” photosynthesis is could be very beneficial. This will help increase the number of crops the planet has which is crucial for future generations to come. As stated before, approximately 9.7 billion people will be on the earth by 2050 and there will food scarcity as well as energy sources. By hacking the process of photosynthesis, we could solve this future problem.