So what's the difference between plant and animal cells?
An organelle is a specific structure inside a cell that performs many different jobs inside a cell. It literally means "little organs". Think about it in a similar way to how organs have functions to keep an organism alive, organelles have specific functions to keep the cell alive.
Animal cells have the following organelles
- Cell-surface (plasma) membrane
- Smooth Endoplasmic Reticulum
- Rough Endoplasmic Reticulum
- Nucleolus
- Nucleus
- Lysosome
- Ribosome
- Nuclear Envelope
- Golgi apparatus
- Cytoplasm
- Mitochondrion
If we're talking about plant cells, there are even more! Plant cells also include:
- A cell wall (made from cellulose, a sugar)
- A vacuole
- Chloroplasts
Let's have a go at defining each of the functions of the organelles! We will cover the functions later on!