SUBJECT: SCIENCE

CLASS: X
General Instructions
● The assignment is designed in such a way so as to facilitate students to comprehend the
concepts properly so that they can attempt the topic- related questions given at the end.
● These questions are designed and selected keeping in mind CBSE Board Exams.
● Students are expected to read from their NCERT book before starting with the assignment for
better comprehension.
CH - 6: LIFE PROCESSES
(HANDOUT- 01)
Molecular movements and their importance
The basic functions performed by the living forms to maintain their life on earth are called life
processes. Movements over very small scales will be invisible to the naked eye – movements of
molecules. These movements are necessary for life. In fact, viruses do not show any molecular
movement in them (until they infect some cell), and that is partly why there is a controversy about
whether they are truly alive or not. We have seen in earlier classes that living organisms are well-
organised structures; they can have tissues, tissues have cells, cells have smaller components in them,
and so on. Because of the effects of the environment, this organised, ordered nature of living structures
is very likely to keep breaking down over time. If order breaks down, the organism will no longer be
alive. So living creatures must keep repairing and maintaining their structures. Since all these structures
are made up of molecules, they must move molecules around all the time.
Mother earth witnesses life in the form of thousands of varieties of plants and animals. There are
beings who live, die and become part of nature again. The living organism can be differentiated from
the inanimate entities on various parameters of life processes.
Life Process
● Maintenance of living organisms is essential even if they are moving, resting or even sleeping.
● The processes which together perform the function of maintenance of life are called life
processes.
● Nutrition, respiration, circulation, excretion are examples of essential life processes.
● In unicellular organisms, all these processes are carried out by that single cell.
● In multicellular organisms, well-developed systems are present to carry out the processes.

Nutrition
The process of obtaining energy through consumption of food is called as nutrition
There are two main modes of nutrition namely autotrophic and heterotrophic nutrition.

Autotrophic Nutrition
If an organism can nourish itself by making its own food using sunlight or chemicals such mode of
nutrition is called as autotrophic nutrition.
● Green plants are autotrophs. They synthesise food by the process of photosynthesis.
● Photosynthesis is a physiological process by which plant cells containing chlorophyll produce
food in the form of carbohydrates using carbon dioxide, water and light energy. Oxygen is
released as a by- product of this process. Chlorophyll is the green pigment found in green plants

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 .
● Chlorophyll is present in chloroplasts.
● Chloroplast is a membrane-bound oval cell organelle.
● It is enclosed by a double membrane. Its interior contains
closely packed flattened sacs called thylakoids. Chlorophyll is present in the thylakoids.
● Thylakoids are arranged in piles called grana lying in a colourless ground substance called
stroma.
● Cells present in the spongy mesophyll layer and the palisade layer contain chloroplasts;
therefore, they are the site of photosynthesis.

Process of Photosynthesis
● Chlorophyll, light, carbon dioxide and water are necessary for photosynthesis.
● The palisade layer is the centre for photosynthesis.
● Light energy is trapped in the chlorophyll of the mesophyll cells in the palisade layer of leaves.
The chemical equation for photosynthesis is:
Chlorophyll
6CO2 +12H2O⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯→ C6 H12 O6 + 6H2O + 6O2 ↑
Sunlight
Events Of Photosynthesis

Mechanism of opening and closing of stomata

● The opening and closing depends upon the turgor pressure in the guard cells.
● The swelling of guard cells due to absorption of water causes opening of stomatal pores while
shrinking of guard cells closes the pores.
● Opening and closing of stomata occurs due to turgor changes in guard cells.

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 ● When guard cells are turgid, stomatal pore is open while in flaccid conditions, the stomatal
● aperture closes which is controlled by the increase and decrease of the concentration of
potassium ions.

Heterotrophic nutrition
Heterotrophic nutrition is typical of animals. These organisms eat organic matter in otherorganisms—
either alive (as hunters) or dead (as scavengers).
Saprotrophic organisms are the decay organisms. They digest dead materials using enzymes that they
secrete externally. Fungi and many bacteria are saprotrophs.
Heterotrophic nutrition can be further divided into two types, viz. saprophytic nutrition and holozoic
nutrition.
Saprophytic Nutrition
In saprophytic nutrition; the organism secretes the digestive juices on the food. The food is digested
while it is still to be ingested. The digested food is then ingested by the organism. All the decomposers
follow saprophytic nutrition. Some insects; like houseflies; also follow this mode of nutrition.
Parasitic Nutrition
Some organisms feed on the expense of another organism and in turn causing it harm. This is called
parasitic mode of nutrition. These organisms live on the body or in the body of a host organism and
derive the nutrients directly from the body of the host. E.g. Leech is an ectoparasite while Ascaris is an
endoparasite. Cuscuta is a parasitic plant.

Nutrition in Amoeba
● Amoeba feeds by holozoic mode of nutrition.
● It engulfs the food particle using pseudopodia, the process is called phagocytosis.
● The engulfed food gets enclosed in a food vacuole.
● As the food vacuole passes through the cytoplasm, digestion, absorption and assimilation take
place.
● When the food vacuole opens to outside, egestion of undigested food takes place.

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Nutrition in Paramecium
● Paramecium also exhibits holozoic nutrition. However, they have cilia that help them to engulf
the food through the oral groove.
● A food vacuole is created enclosing the food. It moves through the cytoplasm, the process is
called cyclosis.
● Food digested in the food vacuole is absorbed by the cytoplasm.
● Undigested food is given out to a tiny pore called anal pore or cytopyge.

Link for Video:

Modes of Nutrition: https://youtu.be/6nCRODqTngg
Nutrition in amoeba: https://youtu.be/5_4Y0tTHqyk
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Nutrition: https://youtu.be/m8Y2uVCt458

NOTEBOOK WORK: Let’s write the answers of Q1 to Q5 in your notebook

Q1. Why is diffusion insufficient to meet the oxygen requirement of multicellular organisms (2)
like humans.
Q2. What are the necessary conditions for autotrophic nutrition and what are its by- (3)
products?
Q3. List the events which occur during Photosynthesis. (3)
Q4. Explain the steps of Holozoic nutrition in Amoeba with the help of diagrammatic (3)
representation.

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Q5. Enumerate the mechanism of opening and closing of stomata with the help diagram. (3)