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Outline of Cells

Cell Theory
Eukaryotes vs. prokaryotes
Cell structures
Tissues
Mitosis
CELL TYPES

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Cells
•Cells are the structural and functional units of life
•Discovered by Robert Hooke (1635–1703) in ca. 1665
using a primitive microscope
•He observed cork cells and coined the term “cells”
for the building blocks of plants that he observed
•This started the whole era of using microscopes to
study biology
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Modern Cell Theory
•All living organisms are composed of one or
more cells
•The smallest life forms capable of self-replication
•The chemical reactions of a cell take place
within the protoplasm
•Cells arise from already existing cells
•Cells contain hereditary information that is
passed on to the daughter cells

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•Cells or organisms divided into two basic groups,
prokaryotes and eukaryotes
•Prokaryotes include bacteria (both true bacteria and
archaebacteria)
•Classified as Monera if 5 kingdom system is used,
but Eubacteria and Archaea if 6 kingdom system used
Procaryotes (both true bacteria and archaebacteria) are
distinct from the Eukaryotes in the following ways:
•They lack a nucleus
•Their DNA in a circular strand without a membrane
•Most lack organelles (membrane-bound)

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Eukarotic cells have structures and organelles:

Cell Wall
Plasma Membrane
Endoplasmic reticulum
Ribosomes
Dictyosomes
Chloroplasts
Chromoplasts
Leucoplasts
•Eukaryotes include all plants above the bacteria Mitocondria
•They have DNA on chromosomes in the nucleus Microbodies
•They have nuclear membrane double layered Vacuoles
•They have organelles bound by membranes Cytoskeleton

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Cell Walls
•Made of cellulose, a polysaccharide, with 100 to
•Distinguishes plant from animal cells
15,000 monomers of glucose attached end to end to
•Functions to provide structural support
form string-like microfibrils
•May have thick or thin walls, depending upon function
•Also present in the cell wall:
•Determines size and shape
Hemicellulose (a glue-like substance that holds
•Protect contents of cell
cellulose fibrils together)
•Basis for most of life on earth, directly or indirectly
Pectin (used in jelly) cements contiguous walls together
•Mammals by themselves cannot digest it
Glycoproteins (sugar + protein molecule)

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derived from primary
walls by addition of
lignin, a complex polymer
•Formed from primary
wall after it ceases growth
•Range in thickness from
5 to 95% of cell volume
•Cells that store, make, or
process food generally
•Between the walls of adjacent cells is the middle have thin walls
lamella, a layer of pectin holding adjacent cells •Support walls have thick
together walls
•Primary cell walls are laid down on either side of it

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•Plasmodesmata (singular, plasmodesma) are strands of
cytoplasm that extend through cell wall openings
•Serve in translocation and allow certain molecules to
pass directly from one cell to another
•Important in cellular communication
•Lined by plasma membrane and traversed by a
desmotubule from the endoplasmic reticulatum
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•Proteins molecules are interspersed, some going
all the way to both sides, some not
•Proteins passing all the way through aid in
passage of certain ions
•Molecules of cholesterol are also found imbedded in it
•It can form folds that break and drift into cytoplasm,
and shrink away from the wall
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Nucleus
•Generally the most conspicuous structure in the cell
(other than chloroplasts in green cells)
•It is the control center of the cell and sends coded
messages via DNA
•Functions: stores the cell’s hereditary information,
and controls all cell activities
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Plasma membrane
•Ca. 8-millionth of a mm thick
•Composed of two layers of phospholipids
•The two layers of phosolipids are arranged with
the “heads” on the outside and the “tails” on the
inside
•Osmosis pushes it up again cell wall
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Functions of the Plasma Membrane
•Serves as an envelope enclosing the cytoplasm
•Controls passage of molecules into and out of the cell,
preventing some and promoting others
•Coordinates the synthesis of cell wall microfibrils
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•Bounded by a double membrane (=nuclear envelope) is
sometimes continuous with endoplasmic reticulatum
•Separates the cytoplasm outside from the nucleoplasm
•Structurally complex pores occupy much of the surface
•One nucleus per cell in higher plants, but many in
some fungi cells lacking partitions (cenocytic)
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•The rest of the nucleus comprises the granular

•Inside the nucleus is one or more nucleoli (singular,
nucleolus)
•Roughly spherical and without a membrane (so a
“suborganelle”
•Made of protein and ribosomal DNA
•Serve in the production and assembly of ribosomes
components
nucleoplasm packed with chromatin, the resting-cell
form of DNA
•Chromatin forms chromosomes when cell is dividing
•Number of chromosomes unrelated to size or
complexity of the species
*Adder’s tongue fern has over 1000
* Goldenweed (Asteraceae) have as low as 4

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•Rough ER is covered with
ribosomes
*Functions in synthesis,
secretion, and storage
of proteins
*Predominates in cells
storing proteins
•Smooth ER is mostly
ER (Endoplasmic Reticulum)
without ribosomes
•Three dimensional membrane system within the cell
*Functions in making lipids
•Network of flattened sacs and tubes that form channels,
*Predominates in cells that
creating subcompartments
secrete lipids
•Double membrane with a space (lumen) between them
•The two are inter-
•Continuous with outer nuclear membrane, which is
convertible, depending
possibly only a specialized type ER
upon cell needs

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•Many cellular respiration

enzymes synthesized
on its surface
•Site of membrane synthesis
•Facilitates cellular
communication and
channeling of materials
•Synthesizing membranes for Ribosomes
other organelles, on •Small ellipsoidal particles 17—23 nm in diameter
the surface or inside •About 60% of mass is RNA, the rest mostly protein
•Considered an organelle, but not membrane bounded
•Located floating in the cytoplasm, on the rough ER, in
other organelles, and on the nuclear membrane

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Golgi Bodies (Dictyosomes)

Comprise two subunits made of RNA and proteins
made in the nucleolus and exported to the cytoplasm
where they are assembled
The two parts function in assembling proteins by
reading (transcribing) messenger RNA and putting
the amino acids in the correct order
•Golgi apparatus collective term for golgi bodies
(dictysomes)
•Roundish flattened sacs scattered in cytoplasm
•Polarized membrane system with one side facing the
nucleus (cis) & the other (trans) the plasma membrane
•Often 5 to 8 in a stack, but 30+ in simpler organisms

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ER collect in (transport)
vesicles that are pinched
off
•Vesicles move to cis side
of Golgi apparatus
•Fuse with Golgi apparatus
•Proteins modified and coded
Golgi Apparatus Functions based on destination
•Like a post office, handling incoming proteins, lipids, •These (secretory) vesicles
etc. and directing their export migrate from trans side to
•Produce and secrete non-cellulose polysaccharides cell membrane, fuse with
sent to the cell wall it, and secrete contents (e.g.,
•Involved in the transport of lipids around the cell, as cell wall polysaccharides,
well as creating lysosomes nectar, essential oils) outside

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Plastids
•Found only in plants and algae (not animals)
•They are organelles bound by a double membrane
•Several kinds concerned with storage and
photosynthesis
*Chloroplasts—for photosynthesis
*Chromoplasts—storage of color pigments
*Leucoplasts—synthesis of starch
•Believed to have originated when a small
prokaryotic cell was engulfed or infected a
eukaryotic cell and became established
permanently in symbiosis
•Theory of endosymbiosis now widely accepted today

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Endosymbiosis theory explains why organelles have
double membrane (and the two are different) and
some of their own DNA
Chloroplast
Most of higher plants like two Frisbees attached
together on edges
Usually 75 to 125 per cell is common, more than that
in algae, and up to several hundred in some plants
Usually 4–6 (2–10 ) microns in diameter
Capture light energy in photosynthesis and convert it
to energy used in cell—virtually all of world’s food

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with double membranes
•40 to 60 granum linked
together by arms
•Each comprise stacks of
2 to 100 thylakoids
•Contain chlorophyll that
carry out photosynthesis
•Starch grains, oil
•Bounded by delicate, double cell membranes, droplets, and enzymes,
•Inner one from cell membrane of a cyanobacterium and sometimes proteins
•Colorless liquid matrix called stroma contains enzymes also found in the
•Has one small circular strand of DNA for synthesizing chloroplast
proteins related to synthesis of proteins used in •Grana are made by DNA
photosynthesis and other activities in chloroplast

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Chromoplast
•Found in complex plants, not algae and lower plants
•Similar in size and shape to chloroplasts, and
sometimes derived from them after loss of chlorophyll
•A type of plastid that contains carotenoid pigments
•They synthesize and store these red, yellow or orange
pigments
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Mitochondria
•Like a scooped out watermelon inside with incomplete
partitions from walls
•Double membrane organelle, thought to be formed
during endosymbiosis
•Form from mature mitochondria (divide independently)
using its own DNA
About 1–3 or more microns long
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Perioxisomes
•Several other kinds of minor structures (“microbodies”)
are found in cells
•Peroxisomes have enzymes involved in photorespiration
•Floating in cytoplasm and bound by a single membrane
•Can reproduce themselves, but no DNA or ribosomes
•A type called a glyoxisome contains enzymes that act
on fats in seed germination
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Leucoplasts
•Common in higher plants, and two common types
Amyloplast, which synthesize and store starches
Elaioplasts, which synthesize and store lipids
•Plastids develop from protoplastids or division of
mature plastids
•Sometimes inter-convertible in light to chloroplasts
•Simpler than plastids and lack elaborate system of
internal membranes
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•Inner membrane forms cristae (partitions)
•These increase surface area for enzymes to work
•Matrix also contains DNA, RNA, ribosomes, proteins,
and dissolved substances
•Common in cell and move about cytoplasm to where
they are needed
•Energy released in cellular respiration inside them
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Vacuoles
•Along with cell wall and plastids, it distinguishes plant
cells from animal cells
•May take up to 90% of cell contents
•The cytoplasm often a thin layer between it and cell wall
•Bounded by vacuolar membranes (tonoplast) single, and
similar to cell membrane
•Filled with cell sap, slightly to moderately acidic
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•Contains inorganic ions, sugars, acids, and amino acids
•Sometimes crystals (often calcium oxalate derived from
other parts of the cell
•Immature cells have small vacuoles that coalesce in
growth
•Vacuolar growth accounts for most cell growth
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Vacuole Functions
•Accumulate substances, and also aid in breakdown and
digestion of organelles Remove toxic secondary
metabolites
•Primary site for pigment deposition
*Sometimes contains water-soluble pigments called
anthocyanins that cause the colors of aging leaves and
flowers
*These differ from carotenoid pigments of chromoplasts,
also part of leaf fall
•Maintains pressure in cell
•Increases surface area by expanding surface of cytoplasm
that is pushed outward and to cell wall

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Cytoskeleton
•Unbranched, thin, tube-like structures like tiny straws
•Made of proteins called tubulins 15 to 25 micrometers
long
•Three kinds: microtubules, actin filaments
(microfilaments), and intermediate filaments
Microtubules
•Control addition of cellulose to cell wall
•Control movement of vesicles from dictysomes
•Found in spindle filaments and phragmoplasts
•Also in flagella and cilia
•Made of the protein tubulin

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TISSUES
other in various ways to form
functional and structural units
•Tissues are groups of cells that
are functionally and/or
structurally distinct
•Simple tissues are comprised
of a single cell type, e.g.,
ground tissues (collenchyma,
Microfilaments (Actin Filaments)
parenychyma, and
•A quarter or third as big as microtubules, composed of
sclerenchyma)
proteins
•Complex tissues are those
•Often in bundles and appear to play a role in
composed of two or more cell
cytoplasmic streaming
types, e.g., xylem, phloem,
•Thought to facilitate exchanges of materials in the cell
periderm, epidermis

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•Apical meristem comprises the meristematic tissues

•Meristematic tissues comprised regions of permanent
growth called meristems
*Not found in animals, only plants
•Two types of meristem
*Apical meristem found at tips of roots and stems
*Lateral meristem that increase girth of roots and stems
found at the tips of roots and stems
•The tissue increases in length as the cells divide
•It produces three kinds of primary meristem in primary
growth
*Protoderm, ground meristem, and procambium
These three meristems develop into primary tissues
*Epidermis, ground tissue, and the cambium

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•Lateral meristem increases the girth (secondary growth)

*Vascular cambium
*Cork cambium
•New cells small and typically six-sided, but grow to
different shapes depending on function
•A maturity, up to 90% of cell is the vacuole

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•Vascular cambium is a thin cylinder of brick-shaped cells

•When cell divides, the girth of the stem increases
•Xylem is formed from the daughter cells inside the
cambium, and phloem from those outside of it
•Individual cells are called initials, those produced are
called derivatives

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•Cork cambium is also a cylinder the length of the
stem and root
•Lies outside vascular cambium and produces bark,
a secondary tissue
•Intercalary meristem are found in grass stems near
nodes to lengthen stem
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•Found in all major parts of higher plants
•Several types of parenchyma
*Aerenchyma of aquatic plants have small spaces
between them for aeration and/or floatation
*Chlorenchyma have numerous chloroplasts and
function mainly in photosynthesis
•May live a long time and can divide on their own and
produce things like scar tissue upon injury to plant
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•Collenchyma is another simple ground tissue
•Typically underneath epidermis
•Thicker walls, pliable and strong, to provide support
(e.g. celery strings) for organs
•Long-lived and contain cytoplasm
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•Simple tissues comprise a single cell type, e.g., ground
tissues (parenychyma, collenchyma, and sclerenchyma)
•Most abundant type of cell in plant (e.g. cortex, pith)
•More or less spherical in shape and 14-sided
•Have large vacuoles often used for storage of water & food
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•Sclerenchyma is a third type of simple ground tissue
•Thick walls generally impregnated with lignin
•Function in support for the plant
•Two types, sclerids and fibers
•Sclerids mostly as long as wide an randomly distributed
in other tissue, e.g. stone cells in pears
•Also form hard layer of stone fruit pits
•Congregated in places rather than random
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•Complex tissues
comprise two or more
kinds of tissue
•Three most important
types—xylem, phloem,
& epidermis
•Most produced by
vascular cambium and
Fibers are found in association with other types of called vascular tissue
tissues
•Longer than wide, with a lumen (cavity) in the center •Xylem is important for transport of water and minerals
•Many plant fibers used commercially (up to 40 from roots to rest of plant
species are used for this) •Comprises parenchyma cells, fibers, vessels, tracheids,
•Like sclerids, they usually lack cytoplasm at maturity and ray cells

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•Tracheids have thick secondary walls and tapered at

•Vessel elements serve in water
•Open at each end, often with bar-like plates extending
across the opening
•Joined end to end to form the vessels
•Found in angiosperms and only a few gymnosperms
•Non-living at maturity and lacking a nucleus
one end, which overlap others
•No openings at ends but pairs of pits where they
contact another
•Pairs of pits where they contact each other and serve in
water transport
•Tracheids are non-living and lack nucleus at maturity

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•Phloem mostly conducts dissolved food from leaves

Have a pit membrane with a disc called a torus
When water flows one way, disc can block hole slowing
down movement
Often have visible spiral thickenings
Lateral transport occurs in rays made of long-lived
parenchyma cells between the xylem like spokes of a
wheel in woody stems
•Two main types of cells, sieve tube elements and
companion cells
•Sieve tube members are long and tubular and form
sieve tubes when laid end to end
•Unlike vessel elements, they have end plates (sieve
plates) with small pores

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•Cytoplasm continuous thru pores between elements
•No nuclei at maturity
•Perhaps controlled by adjacent companion cells
•Contain callose in solution when under pressure
•When pressure drops, callose precipitates, combines
with a protein to produce callose that plugs up the end
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Stomata are opening in the epidermal surface that
allow for the exchange of gasses
•Bordered by pairs of guard cells that open and close
•Shaped differently than other epidermal cells, and have
chloroplasts
•Usually found on the lower leaf surface
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•Companion cells are living with nucleus at maturity
•They are narrower and more tapered that sieve cells
•They are thought to regulate the non-living sieve tube
elements
•In gymnosperms, sieve cells are associated with
albuminous cells, that are derived differently
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•Epidermis tissue is made mostly of parenchyma or
similar cells, but other specialized ones as well
•Mostly one cell layer thick
•Most cells produce a fatty substance called cutin on
both sides of outer wall
•Forms the cuticle on the outside
•Often look like jigsaw puzzle on surface
•Form root hairs on roots
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•Periderm replaces epidermis after secondary growth
Formed by the phellogen (cork cambium) layer
•Comprises mostly rectangular box-like cork (phellem)
cells
•Fatty substance, suberin, secreted into walls as
waterproofing and protection from drying and freezing
•Cork from oaks harvested commercially
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Secretory Cells and Tissues
•Use to secret waste products or substances harmful to
cytoplasm, often into cavities (e.g., citrus oils)
•May function as secretory cells or as part of secretory
tissue
•Often derived from parenchyma
•Flower nectar, citrus oils, mint aromatics, sundew
mucilage, latex, resins
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•Mitosis is occurs until organism dies
•Strictly speaking, nuclear division, but cytokinesis
usually follows immediately
•In most tracheophytes it occurs in meristem (root,
stem tip, and vascular cambium, and cork
cambium of woody plants
•Five minutes to several hours start to finish, mostly
half to 2 or 3 hours
•Initiated by ring-like pre-prophase band of
microtubules just below the cell membrane
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•Lenticels made of loosely packed cells protruding above
surface of the bark
•Gas exchange function and lack suberin that would
inhibit gas exchange
•Often found in bark fissure bases
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Cell Division
•The division of a cell into two daughter cells identical
to the parent is called mitosis
•Differs from meiosis with is a pair of divisions (the
second of which is mitiotic) that result in haploid cells
•The life of a cell or “cell cycle” is divided between
interphase and mitosis
•Most of cycle spent in interphase (non-dividing phase)
*No longer thought of as resting phase
*G1, Gap or Growth 1 period is the lengthy time
after nucleus divides, during with cell grows in size
Mitosis divided into four stages
*Prophase *Metaphase
*Anaphase *Telophase
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•During interphase, the cell increases in size
•Production of substances that effect the next phase
•S period—DNA replication
•G2 period—Organelles divide and microtubules and
other structures produced
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Prophase
•Chromatin condenses to form chromosomes, which
then become shorter, thicker, and visibly two-stranded
•Two chromatids for each chromosome become evident
•Independently coiled and identical to each other
•Held together by centromere
•Sometimes constrictions (satellites) occur, mostly near
ends, but they have no known function
•Nuclear envelope fragments and is absorbed into ER
•Nucleolus disintegrates gradually
•About half of all mitosis time
•Spindle fibers form by end of prophase and arc
between two invisible poles
•Centrioles in animals and some algae and fungi

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•Briefest of phases
•Sister chromatids
pulled apart and to
the invisible poles
•Spindles lose
material from
Metaphase polar ends
•Marked by the alignment of chromosomes in a circle •Centromeres lead
(plate) between two poles, with the centromeres with trailing arms
aligned perpendicular to axis of spindle of chromatids,
•These are attached to the spindle fibers made of assuming a V
microtubules shape
•At the end of metaphase, the centromeres separate •All separate and
from each other move at same time

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Telophase
•Two nuclear envelopes form around daughter •Microtubules apparently trap dictyosome-derived
chromosomes vesicles to fuse & form flattened, hollow cell plate
•Daughter chromosomes lengthen and revert to chromatin •Middle lamella is synthesized from carbohydrates and
•Nucleoli reappear shared between the two daughter cells
•Many of spindle fibers disintegrate •Plasmodesmata formed as ER parts are trapped
•Microtubules form the phragmoplast on the equator between fusing vesicles of cell plate
•Cell plate forms •New plasma membranes & materials added to cell walls

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Differences Between Animal and Plant Cells

•Animal cells have no cell walls
•Plant cells have cell walls with plasmodesmata
connecting cells through the cell walls
•Animal cells do not form a cell plate, but instead
pinch apart rather than forming cell plate
•Most plant cells lack centrioles
•Animal cells have to plastids
•Vacuoles are small or absent in animal cells

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Differences Between Mitosis and Meiosis
•Mitosis is involved in tissue growth, meiosis in the
making of gametes
•Mitosis produces two equal daughter cells that are
identical with the mother cell, while meiosis produces
two daughter cells with different genetic make-up and
only half as many chromosomes as the mother cell
•Mitosis is a single division, meiosis involves two
•In mitosis, the centromere splits and the two
chromatids separate, but in meiosis, identical
chromosomes (sister chromosomes) rather than
chromatids move apart

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