Nature recycles all of the time. We have a whole section on different biogeochemical cycles than happen across the Earth. Nature doesn’t use a carbon atom and then throw it away. Carbon atoms (and all atoms) are used and recycled. They are used by different organisms right away and sometimes left in the Earth to be used again in millions of years. Nature knows there’s only so much stuff on Earth and if it doesn’t find ways to recycle, there will be no life. Earth’s biosphere can be thought of as a sealed container into which nothing new is ever added except the energy from the Sun. Since new matter can never be created, it is essential that living things be able to reuse the existing matter again and again. For the world to work as it does, everything has to be constantly recycled. The carbon cycle is just one of several recycling processes, but it may be the most important process since carbon is known to be a basic building block of life. As the foundation atop which a huge family of chemical substances called organic substances are formed, carbon is the basis of carbohydrates, proteins, lipids, and nucleic acids—all of which form the basis of life on Earth. Since all living things contain the element carbon, it is one of the most abundant elements on Earth. The total amount of carbon on Earth, whether we are able to measure it accurately or not, always remains the same, although the carbon regularly changes its form. A particular carbon atom located in someone’s …
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