What is living? · NCERT Biology

Isolated metabolic reactions in a test tube are:

  1. Fully living things in their own right as organisms
  2. Ordinary non-living things like any chemical
  3. Neither living nor non-living, but living reactions
  4. Purely physical chemistry phenomena only
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Correct answer: Neither living nor non-living, but living reactions

Metabolic reactions performed in-vitro (outside a living system) are not organisms, so they aren't 'living things'. However, because they involve the same biochemical processes found in cells, they are categorized as 'living reactions'.

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