Editing Bioenergetics (section)

{{Short description|Branch of biology}}
{{about|the biological study of energy transformation|the Reichian body-oriented psychotherapy sometimes known as bioenergetics|bioenergetic analysis}}
{{hatnote|For the metabolic processes of ATP synthesis and utilization in the body, see [[Bioenergetic systems]]}}
{{refimprove|date=December 2014}}
'''Bioenergetics''' is a field in [[biochemistry]] and [[cell biology]] that concerns [[energy]] flow through living systems.<ref> Nelson, David L., Cox, Michael M. ''Lehninger: Principles of Biochemistry.'' New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 2013. Sixth ed., pg 24. </ref> This is an active area of [[Biology|biological]] research that includes the study of the transformation of energy in living organisms and the study of thousands of different [[Cell (biology)|cellular]] processes such as [[cellular respiration]] and the many other [[metabolism|metabolic]] and [[Enzyme|enzymatic]] processes that lead to production and utilization of energy in forms such as [[adenosine triphosphate]] (ATP) molecules.<ref>{{Cite journal |pmc = 348741|year = 1981|last1 = Green|first1 = D. E.|title = Universal energy principle of biological systems and the unity of bioenergetics|journal = Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America|volume = 78|issue = 9|pages = 5344–5347|last2 = Zande|first2 = H. D.|pmid = 6946475|doi = 10.1073/pnas.78.9.5344|bibcode = 1981PNAS...78.5344G| doi-access=free }}</ref><ref name="AutoRefB"> Nelson, David L., Cox, Michael M. ''Lehninger: Principles of Biochemistry.'' New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 2013. Sixth ed., pg. 27. </ref> That is, the goal of bioenergetics is to describe how living organisms acquire and transform energy in order to perform biological work.<ref name="AutoRefC"> Nelson, David L., Cox, Michael M. ''Lehninger: Principles of Biochemistry.'' New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 2013. Sixth ed., pg. 24. </ref> The study of [[metabolic network|metabolic pathways]] is thus essential to bioenergetics.