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Multiple Choice

What two gases are transported by hemoglobin?

Hemoglobin’s primary role in gas transport is moving oxygen to tissues and helping remove carbon dioxide from them. In the lungs, oxygen binds to the iron in hemoglobin and is released where it's needed in tissues with lower oxygen levels. At the tissues, carbon dioxide produced by metabolism diffuses into red blood cells and is carried back to the lungs—mostly as bicarbonate in the plasma, with a portion bound to the globin part of hemoglobin as carbaminohemoglobin. In the lungs, CO2 is released and exhaled, while O2 is picked up again. Nitrogen and hydrogen are not normally transported by hemoglobin, and carbon monoxide binds to hemoglobin very strongly but is not a normal transport form. The two gases hemoglobin is responsible for transporting under normal physiology are oxygen and carbon dioxide.

Hemoglobin’s primary role in gas transport is moving oxygen to tissues and helping remove carbon dioxide from them. In the lungs, oxygen binds to the iron in hemoglobin and is released where it's needed in tissues with lower oxygen levels. At the tissues, carbon dioxide produced by metabolism diffuses into red blood cells and is carried back to the lungs—mostly as bicarbonate in the plasma, with a portion bound to the globin part of hemoglobin as carbaminohemoglobin. In the lungs, CO2 is released and exhaled, while O2 is picked up again.

Nitrogen and hydrogen are not normally transported by hemoglobin, and carbon monoxide binds to hemoglobin very strongly but is not a normal transport form. The two gases hemoglobin is responsible for transporting under normal physiology are oxygen and carbon dioxide.