Mitosis and the cell cycle
Mitosis
Cells divide when:
- an organism grows
- an organism becomes damaged and needs to produce new cells
It is essential that any new cells produced contain genetic information that is identical to the parent cell.
The cell cycle
A growing and dividing cell goes through a series of stages called the The events that lead to cell division and DNA replication..
The first stages of the cell cycle involve cell growth, then Made or put together. of new Deoxyribonucleic acid. The material inside the nucleus of cells, carrying the genetic information of a living being., to replicate the original DNA. The single strand of DNA that makes up each chromosome produces an exact copy of itself.
In mitosis, two cells called Cells formed from the division of a cell. are produced, each identical to the parent cell.
When looking at cells with a microscope, the length of different stages of the cell cycle can be estimated using the formula:
\(\text{Length of phase} = \frac{\text{number of cells at that state}}{\text{total number of cells}} \times \text{total length of time in cell cycle}\)