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Somatic cell
 
 
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Somatic cells are any cell
Cell (biology)

The cell is the structural and functional unit of all known Life organisms. It is the smallest unit of an organism that is classified as living, and is often called the building bricks of life....
s forming the body of an organism, as opposed to germline
Germline

In biology and genetics, the germline of a mature or morphogenesis individual is the line of germ cells that have genetic material that may be passed to a child....
 cells. In mammals, germline cells (also known as "gametes") are the spermatozoa and ova which fuse during fertilization to produce a cell called a zygote
Zygote

A zygote is a cell that is the result of fertilization. That is, two ploidy cells—usually an ovum from a female and a sperm cell from a male—merge into a single ploidy cell called the zygote ....
, from which the entire mammalian embryo
Embryo

An embryo is a multicellular organism ploidy eukaryote in its earliest stage of development, from the time of first cell division until birth, Egg , or germination....
 develops. Every other cell type in the mammalian body—apart from the sperm and ova, the cells from which they are made (gametocyte
Gametocyte

A gametocyte is a eukaryotic germ cell that divides by mitosis into other gametocytes or by meiosis into gametids during gametogenesis. Male gametocytes are called spermatocytes, and female gametocytes are called oocytes....
s) and undifferentiated stem cells—is a somatic cell: internal organs, skin, bones, blood, and connective tissue are all made up of somatic cells.

The word "somatic" is derived from the Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
 word soma, meaning "body".

mple definition of a somatic cell is that it is a non-sex cell (a very broad and not always accurate description).






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Encyclopedia


Somatic cells are any cell
Cell (biology)

The cell is the structural and functional unit of all known Life organisms. It is the smallest unit of an organism that is classified as living, and is often called the building bricks of life....
s forming the body of an organism, as opposed to germline
Germline

In biology and genetics, the germline of a mature or morphogenesis individual is the line of germ cells that have genetic material that may be passed to a child....
 cells. In mammals, germline cells (also known as "gametes") are the spermatozoa and ova which fuse during fertilization to produce a cell called a zygote
Zygote

A zygote is a cell that is the result of fertilization. That is, two ploidy cells—usually an ovum from a female and a sperm cell from a male—merge into a single ploidy cell called the zygote ....
, from which the entire mammalian embryo
Embryo

An embryo is a multicellular organism ploidy eukaryote in its earliest stage of development, from the time of first cell division until birth, Egg , or germination....
 develops. Every other cell type in the mammalian body—apart from the sperm and ova, the cells from which they are made (gametocyte
Gametocyte

A gametocyte is a eukaryotic germ cell that divides by mitosis into other gametocytes or by meiosis into gametids during gametogenesis. Male gametocytes are called spermatocytes, and female gametocytes are called oocytes....
s) and undifferentiated stem cells—is a somatic cell: internal organs, skin, bones, blood, and connective tissue are all made up of somatic cells.

The word "somatic" is derived from the Greek
Greek language

Greek is an Indo-European languages native to the southern Balkan peninsula, the language of the Greek people. It forms an independent branch within Indo-European....
 word soma, meaning "body".

Genetics and chromosome content

A simple definition of a somatic cell is that it is a non-sex cell (a very broad and not always accurate description). In humans, somatic cells contain 46 individual chromosomes, organized into 23 pairs of chromosomes. Each pair comprises a chromosome inherited from one of the father's and the other mother. Human somatic cells contain twice as many chromosomes as germline cells (sex cells). Germline cells contain only 23 chromosomes. When the germline cells meet during conception, they "fuse" together, creating a zygote
Zygote

A zygote is a cell that is the result of fertilization. That is, two ploidy cells—usually an ovum from a female and a sperm cell from a male—merge into a single ploidy cell called the zygote ....
. The sex of the child is dependent on the chromosome the germline cells contains (X or Y). Due to the "fusion" of the germline cells, a zygote contains 46 chromosomes (i.e. 23 pairs).

In other species, the situation is more complex. Humans, and other species whose somatic cells contain chromosomes arranged in pairs, are known as "diploid" organisms (their germline cells, which contain only single unpaired chromosomes, are known as "haploid"). However, a large number of species arrange the chromosomes in their somatic cells in fours ("tetraploid") or even sixes ("hexaploid") which means that they can have diploid or even triploid germline cells. An example of this is the modern cultivated species of wheat
Wheat

Wheat , is a worldwide cultivated Poaceae from the Levant region of the Middle East. Globally, after maize, wheat is the second most-produced food among the cereal just above rice....
, Triticum Aestivum L., a hexaploid species whose somatic cells contain six copies of every chromatid.

Somatic cells and cloning technology


In recent years, the technique of cloning whole organisms has been developed in mammals, allowing almost identical genetic clones of an animal to be produced. Any retention of existing mitrochodrial DNA prevents the new cell being identical. One method of doing this is called "somatic cell nuclear transfer
Somatic cell nuclear transfer

In genetics and developmental biology, somatic cell nuclear transfer is a laboratory technique for creating a clonal embryo, using an ovum with a donor nucleus ....
" and involves removing the nucleus
Cell nucleus

In cell biology, the nucleus , also sometimes referred to as the "control center", is a membrane-enclosed organelle found in all eukaryote cell ....
 from a somatic cell, usually a skin cell. This nucleus, which contains all of the genetic information needed to produce the organism it was removed from is then injected into an ovum
Ovum

An ovum is a haploid female reproductive cell or gamete. Both animals and embryophytes have ova. The term ovule is used for the young ovum of an animal, as well as the plant structure that carries the female gametophyte and egg cell and develops into a seed after fertilization....
 of the same species which has had its own genetic material removed. The ovum now no longer needs to be fertilized as it contains the correct amount of genetic material(a diploid number of chromosomes) and, in theory, it can be implanted into the uterus
Uterus

The uterus is a major female hormone-responsive reproductive sex organ of most mammals, including humans. It is within the uterus that the fetus develops during gestation....
 of a same-species animal and allowed to develop. The resulting animal will be a genetically identical clone to the animal from which the nucleus was taken. In practice, this technique has so far been problematic, although there have been a few high profile successes, such as Dolly the Sheep
Dolly the Sheep

Dolly was a Domestic sheep , remarkable in being the first mammal to be cloning from an adult somatic cell cell , using the process of nuclear transfer....
 and, more recently, Snuppy
Snuppy

Snuppy is an Afghan hound, credited with being the world's first cloning dog. The puppy was created using the cell of an ear from an adult Afghan hound and involved 123 surrogate mothers, of which only three produced pups and of these three only one survived....
, the first cloned dog
Dog

The dog is a domesticated subspecies of the Gray Wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties....
.