Respiratory Quotient (RQ)

Apparently all living organisms respire and this includes germinating seedlings. But they dont undergo photosynthesis till they actually grow some leaves so they tap into their food store and use that as a substrate. Apparently you can determine the substrate used by determining the Respiratory Quotient (RQ) by counting the number of moles of carbon dioxide produced over the number of moles of oxygen consumed. Carbohydrates will have an RQ value of 0.5, fats/oils that of 0.7 and protein that of 0.5- 1.0 depending on the type of protein utilised. I just had to write a report on legumes utilising protein as the substrate indicating that it contains alot of protein. And we didnt know that before we entered uni.