Inside a mysterious forest in the atmosphere, lives Carbo and his mother Carlita. Carbo is a little, mischievous carbon atom-which is the basic unit of a chemical element. He’s always grown up around plants, but has never dared go near one because his mother would often warn him and fill him with fear for the dangers within.

Ever since he was young, he rebelled against what others said and tried to do things his own way. The one person he always disobeyed was his mother. It was always him and his mom, he had no knowledge of his father. They both seemed to argue every day over small things. But nevertheless, they both loved each other so much.

One day, Carbo was on his way home from school extremely exhausted from playing football with his best friends, Oxyone and Oxytwo. They are both oxygen atoms and bad influences on Carbo.

When he arrived home, he went straight to bed. Little did he know that he forgot to do his daily chores while his mom was at work. No doubt that when his mother came home, they began to argue once again. This time, their argument seemed to be more intense.

Frustrated, Carbo went straight to his room and was furious. He kept mumbling to himself on how he hated living in his house and arguing with his mom. Carbo kept going back and forth in his room and noticed that there was a cold breeze coming through the window.

He climbed up a chair and tried to shut the window and he had a good idea. What if his life would be easier if he ran away?

Once Carbo thought of this idea he called up his friends, and asked if they would like to accompany him on his mission to get away from his mom. Surely enough, they both were ecstatic about this idea and agreed to join.

Carbo silently climbed out of his window as to not make his mom suspicious, and left outside. While waiting for his friends, he realized that his mom had always told him to stay away from plants, but had never said why.

I wonder why...

Growing even more furious and curious than before, he decided that he was going to get near a plant to see if there was any real danger. As Oxyone and Oxytwo pulled up in their sweet ride, Carbo told them that they were going to a plant to find out the truth and why they are so “mysterious”.

Carbo and the Oxy Twins cruised in the atmosphere and bonded together literally as a molecule called Carbon Dioxide. They parked near a flower and stepped out to admire the hidden beauty.

As they walked closer to examine the flower, they noticed that there were little holes. Oxyone said that he learned about it before in school and that they were called the stomata. Carbo starting realizing that the flower was no threat and decided to go inside the stomata and see what would happen from there. All three of them jumped into one of the holes and noticed that they were completely surrounded by the color green!

STOMATA

Confused with their surroundings, Carbo started to panic about where he was and how he was going to get out. The OxyTwins tried their best to calm him down and started to explain to him what they knew about their location. Oxyone said that they were inside the chloroplast (the organelle that carries out photosynthesis in a plant) more specifically the stroma.

They all started to feel the heat of the sunlight in the chloroplast and it started to slowly break apart the bond between the 3 of them away which no longer made them a molecule. Carbo started to become extremely confused with what just happened. OxyTwo started to explain how they were beginning to be part of the cycle called photosynthesis.

Photosynthesis is when plants use sunlight, carbon dioxide, and water (a liquid that is made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom and it's also a reactant in photosynthesis) to create oxygen (a gas that has the chemical equation of O2 which means it's made up of 2 oxygen atoms and it's also a product in photosynthesis) and glucose as it's own food.

The equation for photosynthesis is 6CO2 + 6H2O —> (light)  C6H12O6 + 6O2.

Plants use photosynthesis to make their own food which makes them an autotroph! The opposite of a autotroph would be a heterotroph, which is an organism that can’t make its own food so it’s dependent on autotrophs for energy and oxygen since the product of photosynthesis includes oxygen.

"Plants can do a lot of amazing things," said Oxy One.

"That's true. It's fascinating how plants are able to create it's own food and gain it's own mass!" said Oxy Two.

"Wait... how does it gain it's own mass?" asked Carbo.

Exhausted from speaking, the OxyTwins looked at each other in annoyance and started to explain.

Exactly! That's why the plants mass is mostly gained from carbon.

The plant begins to gain mass due to adding on the mass of the atoms that are entering it's structure.

Carbo decided that he no longer wanted to stay inside of the plant but he didn’t know how he would get out. After convincing the OxyTwins to help him get out of the plant, all three of the atoms went on their way.

As they were about to go through the first stage of photosynthesis, another carbon dioxide molecule entered the stomata! Carbo became speechless due to her jaw-dropping beauty and it was clearly love at first sight for the both of them.

“Hey”, she said in an angelic voice while flittering her beautiful eyes.

“He-he-hey”, Carbo replied awkwardly as he stumbled to get closer to her.

Instantly, they both knew that they were going to be boyfriend and girlfriend. What a perfect match!

“Oh puppy love”, the OxyTwins replied in unison while rolling their eyes.

He-he-hey

Hey

But all this romance, soon enough broke apart due to the sunlight that tore the new carbon dioxide molecule apart just like it did for Carbo and the OxyTwins. The Oxy Twins were annoyed with Carbo because he didn’t want his new love, Carbonita, to leave him. Just in time though, the OxyTwins came up with a solution. They allowed Carbonita and her friends (the other atoms) to join them on their journey through photosynthesis.

\Let's all go together!

Carbo -not knowing anything about a plant other than what his friends had told him- was indeed, again, confused. The only difference was that he wasn’t the only one that was confused this time. The OxyTwins -being the annoyingly smart but bad atoms- decided to explain what would happen next so everyone could understand.

What now?

OxyOne started to explain the two different types of cycles in photosynthesis: the light independent reaction (The Calvin Cycle) and the light dependent reaction. Light Independent takes place in the stroma while light dependent takes place in the thylakoids. Water and sunlight are absorbed through the light dependent reaction by the chlorophyll while CO2 goes through the Calvin Cycle.

OxyTwo started to explain that the difference between the two cycles are the products or the end results of photosynthesis. The light independent reaction creates oxygen while the Calvin Cycle creates a type of sugar called glucose that has the chemical equation of C6H12O6. Glucose is also a carbohydrate that is a biomolecule which is a molecule inside living organisms. Eventually glucose is converted into starch, fats, and oils for storage and it is used to create cellulose for the cell wall. The cellulose helps with the structure of the roots, stems, and leaves.