The compounds found in living things are known as biochemical compounds or biological molecules. Biochemical compounds make up the cells and other structures of organisms. They also carry out life processes. Carbon is the basis of all biochemical compounds, so carbon is essential to life on Earth. Without carbon, life as we know it could not exist.
Carbon is so basic to life because of its ability to form stable bonds with many elements, including itself. This property allows carbon to create a huge variety of very large and complex molecules. In fact, there are nearly 10 million carbon-based compounds in living things!
Most biochemical compounds are very large molecules called polymers. A polymer is built of repeating units of smaller compounds called monomers. Monomers are like the individual beads on a string of beads, and the whole string is the polymer. The individual beads (monomers) can do some jobs on their own, but sometimes you need a larger molecule, so the monomers can be connected to form polymers.
