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Week 2 · Module overview

Week 2 — The Chemistry of Life

Human Anatomy and Physiology I Free sample edition

Why this matters

A future nurse reading a blood pH on a clinic chart and a runner cooled by sweat on a hot trail both rely on this chemistry.

In plain language

Your body is built from atoms (the tiny units every substance is made of), and four kinds of atom make up about 96% of your mass. Atoms hold together through chemical bonds (the ways atoms hand over or share their outer particles), and the bonds in water explain why water can dissolve salt, soak up heat, and cushion a joint. This week you also learn to read pH (a number that tells you how acidic or basic a liquid is) and to see why a change of 3 units on that scale means 1,000 times more acid. Your blood stays inside a narrow pH band, and a buffer (a pair of chemicals that pushes back against a change in acidity) helps keep it there. Every later week, from the cell to the nerve impulse, runs on this chemistry.

  • Already covered: Week 1, Body Organization, Homeostasis & Anatomical Terminology, gave you the levels of organization and homeostasis: a set point, a normal range, and negative feedback.
  • This week: atoms, the three bonds, water's four jobs, the pH scale, buffers, and the organic compounds with ATP.
  • How they connect: this week zooms in on Week 1's chemical level, and Week 1's homeostasis returns as the blood's pH range.
  • Where we're going next: Week 3, The Cell & Membrane Transport, moves water and ions across the cell's membrane.

Focus

What is your body made of chemically, and how does it hold blood pH in a narrow band?

By the end of this module, you should be able to:

  • [ ] name what decides an element and sort a bond by its electrons
  • [ ] link water's four jobs to its polarity
  • [ ] compare two pH values by counting steps, then raising ten
  • [ ] read a blood pH against 7.35 to 7.45 and name each departure

To-do

Plan your week

  1. Read Chapter 2 (about 45 minutes), then the lecture and slides.
  2. Work the tutorial (60–90 minutes) and practice set (20 minutes).
  3. Do the A&P Lab & Inquiry (two hours), the discussion, and the assignment.
  4. Take the quiz.

This week's checkpoint: say how many times more hydrogen ions pH 4 carries than pH 7, by counting steps.

You've got this

Ask your instructor early if you get stuck.

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