DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PROKARYOTE AND EUKARYOTE

REASON OF CLASSIFICATION It took a long time for the people to

understand the cell. After the acceptance of cell as a basic unit of

life, the scientists observed that some cells are different from each other and some are same, and some are in between.

So scientist community decided to classify the cell; two basic types of cells are prokaryotic and eukaryotic.

The very first classification was done on the basis of presence of nucleus, but its not the only reason as well.

DEFINITIONPROKARYOTE CELL EUKARYOTIC CELLPRO means “before” KARYOTE is derived from the word “KARYON” meaning nucleus or “kernel”

EU means “true” KARYOTE means “Karyon”

Prokaryotic organisms are those which were evolved before the nucleus or they don't have any nucleus inside the cell.

Eukaryotes are those cells which have nucleus inside the cell and comprise of proper organelles and boundaries.

MAJOR DIFFERENCES

Size of Cell Prokaryotic cells are usually smaller in size.

While eukaryotic cells are bigger, they may be so bigger as could be seen by naked human eye e.g. EGG

Metabolism of cell Usually the metabolic reactions are the simplest and occur as per single cell.

Oftenly reactions are tremendously complex and occur as multi cells.

Organelles Not found Highly complex organelles; double membrane e.g. mitochondria, Golgi complex etc

Chromosome Found in cytoplasm. single celled with plasmid

Found in nucleus and usually invisible. Many in one cell, human body has 46 chromosomes in a cell.

EXAMPLES OF PROKARYOTES Prokaryotes are all single-celled organisms,

most of which you know of as bacteria. For example, the famous (or infamous)

Escherichia coli bacterium is a prokaryote, as is the streptococcus bacterium responsible for strep throat. 

Amoeba, Bacteria, Paramecium, Chlaymadomonas etc.

EXAMPLES OF EUKARYOTES Usually multicellular but sometimes,

unicellular too. Some common examples are as follows; Animal cell, plant cell, mushrooms, yeasts etc