[jessicaaxx13]

Why isn't water a major building block of life?

[asking]

Why isnt water a major building block of life?

The building blocks of life are small molecules that can be connected (like lego bricks) to make big molecules. There are four kinds of building blocks: amino acids can be linked together to build proteins; sugars can be linked together to build carbohydrates; fatty acids can be linked together to build fats and oils: nucleic acids can be linked together to build either DNA or RNA (molecules that carry information). Organisms don't link water molecules together to make bigger molecules.

You are right that water is very important to life. Most cellular chemistry takes place in water. ALSO, when cells build big molecules (like proteins or DNA) from small building blocks molecules (like the ones I just listed), they do it through "dehydration reactions." That is they remove a hydrogen from one small molecule and a hydroxide (OH) from another and the two molecules click together. Most of the building block molecules are linked together using this same dehydration reaction, which removes one molecule of water (one oxygen and two hydrogens) from each pair of building blocks. So your question is a good one. But water is still not a building block of life. Just amino acids, fatty acids, nucleic acids, and sugars.

Just Asking