Where do atoms come from in new babies?

Question

This might be a stupid question. If atoms can not be created or destroyed, where do the atoms needed to make a person come from? When a woman gets pregnant where do the carbon, oxygen, etc. atoms come from that are needed to make a human?

I'm not an idiot. I know what cells and atoms are and how pregnancy works. My question was: Where the ATOMS comes from? Cells are completely irrelevant. They come from the food the mother eats. I wasn't aware food had oxygen and carbon and other element, but you learn something new everyday.

Answer 1

People who are saying it comes from the egg and cell division, are missing the point of your great question.

Cells don't just divide, they *grow* (or else each replicated cell would be half the size of the original cell). Where do the *atoms* come from that allow cells to grow?

The answer, quite simply, is from the food the mother ingests during pregnancy. That's why pregnant mothers have to eat so much.

I have a friend who was nursing her new baby and said "look, I'm building a baby out of milk."

Answer 2

Good question!

The "atoms" which make the human come exclusively from the mother (with an almost insignificant contribution of "atoms" from the father's sperm). All that the mother ingests during the pregnancy, and actually for a few months beforehand, will help to form the baby.

This is why it is so important for pregnant women to eat right and not drink/smoke!

Answer 3

think of atoms as the legos that everything organic and inorganic is made of. you are made of an uncountable number of atoms (there is no such thing as an "organic" atom it is all in the way the atoms are put together) knowing this some of what the mother eats is provided to the developing child for it to use through the blood circulated in the umbilical cord, the child's body gets it from the blood stream the same way the mothers body does. and no the mothers blood doesn't pass into the child. they are seperate systems both connected by a permiable membrane that is another question though.

Answer 4

they come from the egg and sperm cell that fuses which will become the zygote.
this fertilized cell will then split millions of times via mitosis which will form the fetus.
the "main" atoms that will eventually form the fetus comes from the egg and sperm. the nutrients needed for it to continue to grow and will keep that fetus alive comes from what the mother eats.

(when cells divide they dont become half the size of the original cell. the newly formed daughter cells are exactly the same as the original)

Answer 5

Creation is microscopic. Growth requires food and water. A baby feeds off its mother. With excellent prenatal care and vastly improved nutrient supplements, babies are being born a pound or more heavier than twenty years ago. In some cases babies are outgrowing the womb and require C-sections.

Answer 6

The sperm and the egg meet, and from there, cells just start dividing. When a cell divides, now you have 2 cells. Then they divide, and now you have four. Then those 4 divide, and now you have 8. It just keeps going. As they divide, they differentiate into ears, organs et cetera. After 3 months or so, it stops being a clump of cells and starts being a baby. Some cells continue to divide all your life, that's how you keep making new skin and stuff. Cool huh?

Answer 7

the atoms that make all of us and restore all of us on a daily basis come from our environment; from breathing, eating, drinking and absorption through the skin and other body openings

Answer 8

from the food and drink the mother intakes. That's why women eat so much more during pregnancy.

Answer 9

they are in the egg that the baby comes from and an atom is different then a cell!!! the carbon, etc. are their already~~~!!!!