You may think you expend energy only when doing exercise, or when awake and moving around, but you are using energy all the time, even when you are asleep or lying still and relaxing. Energy is the basis of life. For example, your ability to maintain a healthy body temperature and support your breathing is called your basal metabolic rate, and you use more energy for these functions than for any other. Your body also uses energy to build new tissue, repair damaged tissue, and generate new, healthy cells. Even a simple eye movement requires energy.

How does my body keep energy flowing through my system all of the time?

You get all the energy you use from the food you eat, so sometimes we hear food talked about as if it were gas for a car engine. This is really not the best analogy, though, since gas is in a form that can be directly burned in the car engine, resulting in immediate energy. Food contains energy in the bonds that hold it together, but your body has the challenge of getting this energy released and then recapturing it, so it can be stored to be used later when and where it's most needed.

Producing energy in the form your body can use requires many steps, and food plays a number of roles. Some of the food you eat is broken down, and the energy in its bonds is stripped and transferred to molecules in your body that can immediately use the energy. Some of the foods you eat contain key nutrients -- vitamins and minerals -- that are necessary to support the energy transfer process. Some foods provide phytonutrients that protect your cells from incorrect or unbalanced energy production, which can cause damage to your cells and tissues. Still, other foods provide the building blocks for keeping your cells healthy, and since energy is produced within your cells, your cells need to have enough of the proteins involved in energy transfer and strong lipid membranes to competently transfer energy.

How does my body make energy from food?

The main types of food used to provide energy ' that is, the foods that are stripped of their energy, so it can be used by your body ' are carbohydrates and fats. Sometimes amino acids from proteins are used for this as well, but only when your body doesn't have enough of the carbohydrates and fats available. We often call this "burning" foods for energy, but it is really a process of breaking these molecules down piece by piece and transferring the energy that is released during this breakdown. The carbohydrate or fat is destroyed in the process. This breakdown of foods and transfer of energy requires oxygen, which you get from breathing, and results in carbon dioxide and water as waste products.

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