Compare and contrast a motor nuerone and a bacterium

The first 200 words of this essay...

The aim of this essay is to compare and contrast a salmonella bacteria (prokaryotic) cell with a motor neurone (eukariotic) cell.

Cells are the basic structures contained in all living organisms, their function, size and shape differ depending on which organism serves as its host. They are catagorised as either eukaryotic or prokaryotic cells, prokaryotic being the old Greek term meaning 'before nucleus'.

It wasn't until the 17th century that cells were discovered by the European Antonie van Leeuwenhoek with his latest invention - a very primitive microscope. These new discoveries were later named by an English scientist by the name of Robert Hooke. (Wikipedia 2007)

The eukaryotic cell can be found in either animals or plants, although the two are very different in both structure and function. The animal cell has a complex internal structure containing many membrane bound organelles that individually have a defined role to play within the cell - more detail will be given about the motor neurone later in this essay. Most animal cells have the same basic parts, namely, nucleus, cell membrane, and cytoplasm with various membrane bound organelles (see appendix 1).

The prokaryotic (bacteria) cell has a more