Unit I Flashcards
What is a centrosome?
It is a centrally located microtubule organizing center. It also contains a pair of centrioles that separate to form spindle poles during mitosis.
What is a cytoskeleton?
Organizes the cell structure, shape and arrangement of subcellular organelles.
It consists of three major components: microtubules, thin filaments (made of actin) , and intermediate filaments.
What is the cytoplasm?
Everything inside the plasma membrane excluding the nucleus.
What is the cytosol?
Fluid surrounding the organelles.
What is the endoplasmic reticulum?
Network of membranous tubules that extend from the nuclear envelop throughout the cell.
Major site of protein and membrane lipid synthesis.
Regions with ribosomes attached to the cytosolic surface are called rough endoplasmic reticulum and regions without ribosomes are called smooth endoplasmic reticulum.
What are endosomes?
Series of organelles that sort endocytosed materials sending them to lysosomes or back to the plasma membrane.
What is the Golgi Apparatus?
Consists of a stack of flattened sacs that can be divided into 3 compartments: cis Golgi network, medial Golgi stacks, and trans Golgi network.
Proteins and lipids synthesized in the ER are delivered to the Golgi stack where they are modified, sorted and packaged for secretion or delivery to lysosomes or the plasma membrane.
What are lysosomes?
Low pH organelles containing digestive enzymes that work best at low pH.
Responsible for digesting worn out or unwanted organelles as well as macromolecules and particles taken into the cell by endocytosis.
The digestion products are typically re-used by the cell.
What is a mitochondria?
Powerhouse of the cell generating most of the ATP required by mammalian cells via fuel oxidative phosphorylation.
Contains two membranes separating the mitochondrial matrix from the cytosol.
Inner membrane is extensively folded to form cristae containing the electron-transport chain and ATP synthase.
Contains it own small circular DNA in the matrix compartment that encodes a handful of proteins.
What is a nucleus?
Typically the largest and most prominent organelle in the cell.
Surrounded by double membrane (nuclear envelop), containing nuclear pores that control passage of macromolecules into and out of the organelle.
Contains DNA in the form of chromosomes, and is the site of DNA replication and transcription.
What is the nucleolus?
The substructure within the nucleus responsible for the transcription and processing of rRNAs and for assembly of ribosomes subunits.
What are peroxisomes?
Small organelles containing enzymes involved in oxidative reactions that break down lipids and destroy toxic molecules.
Reactions produce toxic hydrogen peroxide (hence the organelle name) which can be used in oxidative reactions or degraded.
What is the plasma membrane?
Separates the cell interior from the exterior and acts as a permeability barrier.
Composed of a lipid bilayer containing embedded proteins.
Mandy of the lipids and proteins in the membrane contain covalently attached carbohydrate chains on the outer surface.
What are proteasomes?
Cylindrical protein degredation machines located in the cytoplasm responsible for most of the protein turnover in the eukaryotic cell.
Proteins destined for degredation are tagged with ubiquitin and fed into the cylinder where proteases chop them into short peptides that are released into the cytosol.
What are ribosomes?
Particles composed of RNA and protein, responsible for catalyzing the synthesis of proteins.
What are the functions of Biological Membranes?
1) Selective permeability barrier
2) Compartmentalization of functions
3) Identification
4) Signalling
5) Energy Storage
What are common features of biological membranes?
1) Sheetlike structures that can form closed boundaries in aqueous solution.
2) Composed of lipid, protein and carbohydrate.
3) Lipid bilayer is relatively impermeable to polar, hydrophilic molecules.
4) Membrane proteins carry out most specific functions.
5) Membranes are held together by non-covalent interactions.
6) Biological membranes are asymmetric (two faces of membrane are different).
7) Membranes are fluid structures under physiological conditions.
What are the properties of membrane lipids?
Membrane lipids are amphipathic:
- have hydrophobic and hydrophilic parts
- polar head groups are hydrophilic
- hydrocarbon chain “tails” are hydrophobic
- form an oriented monolayer at an air-water interface
- in aqueous solution, they form micelles or lipid bilayers
What are phospholipids composed of?
fatty acids, backbone, phosphate, alcohol head group
What are the characteristics of fatty acid chains?
- contain an even number of carbon atoms (14-24) dictated by the biosynthetic pathways for fatty acid synthesis
- can be saturated or unsaturated (with double bonds in the cis conformation)
- length and saturation of fatty acid chains greatly affect membrane fluidity
What are common alcohols that form the headgroups?
Serine, ethanolamine, choline, inositol
What are glycolipids?
Membrane lipids
In animal cells they usually have sphinogosine backbone with a sugar attached to the primary hydroxyl group (rather than a phosphoryl choline as in sphingomyeline).
What is cholesterol?
Membrane lipid type.
An important sterol present in eukaryotic membranes (especially the plasma membrane). It has a very small (OH) headgroup and the ring structure is much less flexibile than the fatty acid chains of other lipids.
What are the amphipathic properties of membrane lipids? **
Membrane Lipid/ Hydrophobic Part/ Hydrophilic Part
Phosphoglycerides/ fatty acid chains/ phosophorylated alcohol
Sphingomyelin/ fatty acid chain plus hydrocarbon chain of sphingosine/ phosphoryl choline
Glycolipid/ fatty acid chain plus hydrocarbon chain of sphingosine/ one or more sugars
Cholesterol/ everything except OH/ OH group