What does [CH₂O] represent in the empirical equation of photosynthesis?

Step-by-step solution

By the middle of the nineteenth century the key features of plant photosynthesis were known, namely, that plants could use light energy to make carbohydrates from CO2 and water. In the empirical equation representing the total process of photosynthesis for oxygen evolving organisms, [CH2O] represented a carbohydrate (e.g., glucose, a six-carbon sugar). A milestone contribution to the understanding of photosynthesis was that made by a microbiologist, Cornelius van Niel (1897-1985), who, based on his studies of purpl