You are probably familiar with several types of cells in your body, such as blood cells, skin cells, and brain cells. While these cells have distinctive structures and functions, they and other eukaryotic cells share many features, and it is these common features that we will discuss in this section.
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Eukaryotic cells differ from prokaryotic cells in that they contain membrane-
Each organelle carries out a different specific function that, when combined with others, allows the cell to function as a whole.
Activity 5.3 Eukaryotic Cell Tour
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Eukaryotic cells generally have lengths or diameters about ten times greater than those of prokaryotes. Like prokaryotic cells, eukaryotic cells have a cell membrane, cytoplasm, and ribosomes. Other structures in eukaryotic cells analogous to those in prokaryotes include a cytoskeleton composed of protein fibers and, outside the cell membrane, an extracellular matrix. But as you learned earlier in this chapter, eukaryotic cells also have compartments within the cytoplasm that are separated by membranes.