why are the differences between the cells we look at importa

why are the differences between the cells we look at important? Why is whether or not red blood cells have nuclei important?

Solution

why are the differences between the cells we look at important?

Say someone is diagnosed with fever. The doctor would proceed to treat for fever and check to see if it subsides. If say, it does not. The doctor needs to probe deeper into the why the fever has not subsided So he further asks for some blood tests to be conducted on the patient. The intent is to go deeper and understand the connection between the fever and something within the body that may be causing the fever, so that the patient is treated with a suitable drug. Once he gets the blood report, he can conclude that the patient is having some bacterial or malarial infection that could be treated with drug of choice for that infection.

Like the doctor could not understand the real cause of fever without going deeper towards the root cause, we cannot understand or fully appreciate complex forms of life unless we fully understand life in its simplest form. An independent cell is the simplest form of life, from which everything comes.

We first tried understanding the unicellular cell, amoeba, which is presumed to be existing on earth for ages and starting from it we start comparing different cells. Similar cells aggregate into tissues, tissues form organs and set of many such organs form more complex bodies. The key to understanding any living body thus is to understand the fundamental cell and since there are many cells, we need understand these different cells, or putting it the other way, understand the differences amongst cells.

Why is whether or not red blood cells have nuclei important?

We assume nucleus of cells to be central to any cell, since it contains the DNA, which is the main component of any cell, for it to regenerate further of its own kind. So for anyone who has been studying cells and finding a nucleus in every type, it is quite a curious case for him or her to come across a cell without any nucleus. In fact, it would be beyond imagination for a cell to have reproduced in the first place, with a lack of nucleus. The very fact that we start thinking of it as cell actually existing despite lacking a nucleus gets us into the realm where its having a nucleus and not having one matters!

As it turns out the red blood cells do have a nucleus when they are produced in the bone marrow. The nucleus is lost at a later stage and this is believed provide for the cells to become tinier enough to reach the capillaries of our extremities, accommodate more oxygen and have a distinctive bi-convex shape that aids diffusion of gases.