Apoptosis OR Programmed cell death.(5 marks only)
Apoptosis vs. necrosis
- Apoptosis is a form of programmed cell death, or “cellular suicide.” It is different from necrosis, in which cells die due to injury.
- Apoptosis is an orderly process in which the cell’s contents are packaged into small packets of membrane for “garbage collection” by immune cells.
- Apoptosis removes cells during development, eliminates potentially cancerous and virus-infected cells, and maintains balance in the body.
Apoptosis vs. necrosis
- Broadly speaking, there are two ways that cells die in a multicellular organism such as yourself:
- They are killed by things that harm them (such as toxic chemicals or physical injury), a process called necrosis.
- They are triggered to undergo programmed cell death. The best-understood form of programmed cell death is apoptosis.
- When cells are damaged by harmful factors (such as injury or toxic chemicals), they usually “spill their guts” as they die. Because the damaged cell’s plasma membrane can no longer control the passage of ions and water, the cell swells up, and its contents leak out through holes in the plasma membrane. This often causes inflammation in the tissue surrounding the dead cell.
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