Vital functions of living beings

The vital functional of living beings are those Biological functional characteristics that each and every one of the beings considered alive. Unlike inert beings, living beings have complex functions and characteristics during all their growth and development.

Thus, being the living beings of complex molecular organization, their vital functions are those that allow them to survive and remain constantly related to their environment, both with individuals of the same species and with other different species. Each and every one of the living beings that inhabit the planet Earth, however different they seem to each other, share the vital functions. We can say that they exist 6 vital functions of living beings:

• Be born
• Breathe.
• Feed.
• Adapt to the environment.
• Grow.
• Breed.

However, these are usually summarized in 3 common vital functions:

• Nutrition.
• Relationship or interaction.
• Reproduction.

In the next sections we will define each of them and see examples of the vital functions of living beings to understand them better.

The first function of living beings, nutrition, allows them to grow and develop through the acquisition of nutrients that need to develop their organs and tissues. To do this, they can follow an autotrophic diet, which is the nutrition of plants and other vegetables, or a heterotrophic diet. Thus, the nutrition processes carried out by all living beings allow to establish complex chains or trophic networks in ecosystems.

Within this important vital function, the Respiratory processes for which living beings obtain the necessary energy to keep in operation the enzymatic machinery of their cells. For example, thanks to the processes of photosynthesis and breathing and that of nutrition, plants transform inorganic nutrients (water and light) into organic components (carbon compounds), which transport to the different parts of their organism to grow. If you want to learn more about it, we encourage you to read this post about where the plants breathe and how they do it and this other about 105 animals that breathe through the lungs.

To learn much more about this function, we recommend you read this other ecology article about the nutrition function: what is and processes.

The Fvital anointing relationship or interaction allows living beings receive information from your environment and answer To her to survive. The relationship function in plants is based on their response to chemical stimuli that are capable of receiving through complex chemical and physical mechanisms that they have both in their roots, as on their stems and leaves. For example, in the face of a situation of water stress or lack of water, plants close their stomata to avoid discarding. On the other hand, the relationship function in animals includes the participation of the organs of the senses and a complex nervous system, which allow them to have the surprising ability to communicate with other living beings and be able to respond to environmental changes in different ways.

To learn more about this vital function, we recommend you enter the links to our specific articles on:

• Relationship function: What is, phases and examples.
• What are intraespecific relationships and examples.
• Interspecific relationships: types and examples.

The third and last of the main vital functions is the reproduction of living beings. This allows living beings to multiply the number of existing individuals of each species and thus create new generationswhile transmitting their genetic information (genetic inheritance).

There is a wide variety of Types of reproductionwhich are mainly grouped into sexual reproduction (being necessary the intervention of two individuals of different sex) and the asexual reproduction (No mating between individuals is necessary). Some living beings are even able to alternate both reproduction processes according to environmental conditions or their development stage. This is the case, for example, of the jellyfish, which develop asexually while they are in polyp stage and subsequently reproduce sexual during their maturity.

If you want to learn more about this vital function of living beings, here you can find information about:

• Reproduction function: what is and why it is important.
• Plants reproduction.
• The reproduction of hermaphrodite animals with examples.

If you want to read more articles similar to Vital functions of living beingswe recommend that you enter our biology category.