CELLULAR BASIS OF LIFE
parenchyma cells of leaves. They are usually made of
Discovery of the Cell
A scientist named Robert Hooke was the first
person to use the term cells to refer to the tiny structures
found in organisms. Around 1665, Hooke observed a
piece of cork with the use of a microscope which he
himself made. There he observed boxlike compartments
in the cork. Hooke thought they looked like the small
rooms or cells of old monasteries. He called these room-
like structures in cork, cells. What Hooke really saw were
the outer boundaries of the cells. They looked like empty
boxes because the cells were dead.
Many other scientists studied cells. In 1831
Robert Brown reported seeing small bodies in the cells
he studied and called them nuclei (singular form is
nucleus). Years later in 1839, Johannes Purkinje
observed the complex fluid inside the cells and named it
protoplasm.
The Cell Theory
In the late 1830s two German scientists, Mathias
J. Schleiden, a plant biologist, and Theodor Schwann,
an animal biologist, worked on various organisms—
Schleiden, on plants, and Schwann, on animals. They
worked separately but they arrived at the same
conclusion, which came to be known as the cell theory.
According to this theory, all organisms are made up of
fundamental units called cells. Cells are not only units of
structure; they are also units of function in organisms.
This means that individual cells have specific roles in the
organism.
Another German physician, Rudolf Virchow,
discovered that cells increased in number by dividing
and formed new cells. Thus, the cell theory also states
that new cells arise or come from existing cells.
Plant and Animal Cells
Plants and animals consist of cells that have
distinct parts. These parts carry out functions that enable
the cells to maintain their activities and sustain life.
Food production of plants occur in the
relatively large cells. Their thin cell walls make possible
the easy exchange of water and nutrients between cells.
Parenchyma cells are also found in the growth regions of
stems and roots and play an important role in wound
healing and the regeneration of these parts.
Parenchyma cells serve as storage for food, forming the
fleshy tissues of fruits and vegetables.
Collenchyma cells have uneven cell walls.
These cell walls are thicker than those of the
parenchyma cells. Collenchyma cells are elongated and
can stretch to provide mechanical support to elongating
parts of the plant. Collenchyma cells are commonly
found below epidermal regions of the stems.
Sclerenchyma cells have very thick walls to
support mature plant parts like fibers and seeds. They
are usually dead cells. Their cell walls have lignin that
makes them waterproof. Plant fibers and stone cells of
fruits like chico as well as seed coats of coconut shells
are made of sclerenchyma cells.
Like plants, animals have cells with different
forms, sizes, and shapes that are related to their
functions.
Smooth muscle cells are elongated and have
pointed ends. The nucleus of each cell is found near the
center of the cell. Smooth muscle cells are found in
internal organs except in the heart and in the walls of
blood vessels.
Skeletal muscle cells are also called striated
muscle cells because of their striped appearance when
viewed under a compound microscope. They are large
cells.
The nerve cell or neuron consists of an
enlarged portion, the cell body which contains the
nucleus and other organelles. Two types of nerve fibers,
the dendrites and the axon extend from the cell body. In
humans, these nerve fibers can reach one metre long.
Erythrocytes, commonly known as red blood
cells, are unique because they usually lose their nuclei
as they develop. This is to give way to their important
function as carriers of oxygen to the different parts of the
body. However, red blood cells of most of the other
vertebrates like birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish
retain their nuclei throughout their lifespan.
Cellular Organelles
With the improvements made in the earlier light
microscopes and the invention of the electron
microscope, the finer structures or ultrastructures called
organelles, of the cell become observable. These
organelles have specific functions.
The diagrams of the generalized plant and
animal cells in Figure 2.7 are a result of putting together
several electron micrographs or pictures as seen
under the electron microscope.
Notice that in Figure 2.7 the whole cell is
enclosed by plasma membrane. All the cell contents
within the plasma membrane but outside the nucleus
make up the cytoplasm. It has a semifluid portion, the
cytosol, where the organelles of the cell, except the
endoplasmic reticulum and the mitochondria, are
suspended. Thus, the cytoplasm is not at all
homogeneous as it appears when viewed under a
compound microscope.
The nucleus is the prominent spherical
structure in the cell because it is larger than most of the
other organelles. It serves as the control center, directing
and coordinating all the activities of the cell. The nucleus
contains the chromosomes with DNA and may have a
nucleolus or two nucleoli. The nucleolus appears as a
dark round body inside the nucleus where RNA are
transcribed and assembled. These have important roles
in cell division and in heredity which will be discussed in
detail later.
Eukaryotic and Prokaryotic Cells
What you have been reading and familiarizing
yourselves with are eukaryotic cells with a distinct
nucleus enclosed by a membrane. Except for red blood
cells and plant cells like vessels, tracheids, and phloem
elements which when mature also lacks nucleus and
cytoplasm, eukaryotic cells make up most of an
organism’s body. Organisms with this kind of cells are
called eukaryotes. Some eukaryotes, such as amoeba
and paramecium, are single-celled.
Some very small and simple, single-celled
organisms like bacteria and cyanobacteria do not have
well-defined membrane-enclosed nucleus and
organelles. Such cells are called prokaryotic cells.
Organisms with prokaryotic cells are called
prokaryotes.
In a bacterial cell, one chromosome consisting
of a thin, long circular molecule of double-stranded DNA
is attached to the plasma membrane. Since there is only
one chromosome, genes are not in pairs unlike in
eukaryotes. The mesosome, an infolding of the plasma
membrane, aids in moving particles out of the bacterium.
Prokaryotes have small circular DNA called plasmids
scattered in the cytoplasm. Their cell walls are rigid and
are made of lipids, carbohydrates, and proteins, unlike
the cell walls of plant cells which are made of cellulose.
Prokaryotes Eukaryotes
No nucleus With nucleus
No membrane- With membrane-enclosed
enclosed organelles organelles
Have one chromosome Have chromosomes in pairs
Have no cellulose in Have cellulose in cell walls
cell walls
Have smaller Have larger ribosomes
ribosomes
No movement of Cellular materials often
cellular materials within appears to move (streaming)
the cell within the cell
Have simple Have complex cytoskeleton
cytoskeleton
Have solid flagella Have complex tubular flagella
Do not undergo cell Undergo cell division by
division by mitosis mitosis
Unicellular and Multicellular Organisms
Organisms with more than one to a hundred,
thousands, or millions of cells are referred to as
multicellular. These organisms have different groups of
specialized cells that perform specific functions. For
example, some cells of a mango tree have a
photosynthetic function; others are for storage of food.
Some of your body cells transmit messages while others
transport oxygen from the lungs to various parts of the
body.
Other organisms exist as a single-celled
organism and perform all functions within one cell. They
are called unicellular organisms. Bacteria, amoeba,
and yeasts are examples of unicellular organisms.
Uses of Cells and Cellular Products
Cells secrete certain substances during or after
cellular activity. Agriculture and other industries use
products of cellular activities to improve yield or to
produce industrial chemicals. Some cell secretions have
been used by people to promote health as well as to
increase production.
Prokaryotes and eukaryotes have long been
used in traditional biotechnology especially in the food
production process. The bacterium Acetobacter for
example, produces an enzyme used to ferment sugar
and to produce acetic acid like vinegar.
Genetic engineering through recombinant DNA
technology has made possible, for example, the
production of interferon using the bacteria Escherichia
coli in large quantities and at lower cose. Interferon is a
protein that slows down the growth of viruses and
inhibits the transformation of normal cells to tumor cells.
It is currently used to treat certain types of cancer.
Gene therapy is another application of
recombinant DNA technology. Here, a gene from a
healthy human cell is inserted into the gene of a virus.
The virus containing the inserted gene then enters
defective cells such as bone marrow cells of bone
cancer patients. The DNA of the healthy gene becomes
inserted into the defective cell’s DNA. The “corrected”
cell is injected back and multiplies in the patient, curing
him or her of the disease.