Vacuole
A versatile organelle for storage, waste, and pressure in cells.
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Vacuoles are enclosed compartments filled with water containing inorganic and organic molecules, and sometimes solids.[1] Vacuoles are membrane-bound compartments present in plant and fungal cells, and also in some protist, animal, and bacterial cells.[1] Multiple membrane vesicles fuse to form vacuoles, which are essentially larger versions of those vesicles; the organelle lacks a fixed shape or size, with its structure adapting to what the cell needs.[2]
Quick Facts
- Type
- Membrane-bound organelle
Facts from the source article.
Key facts and history
Spallanzani in 1776 observed contractile vacuoles in protozoa, initially misidentifying them as respiratory structures.[3] The term "vacuole" was applied to these "stars" by Dujardin in 1841.[3] Using biochemical methods in the mid-1970s, Christian de Duve identified mammalian lysosomes.[3] De Duve coined the name "lysosomes" from the Greek words for digestion (lysis) and body (soma), reflecting their biochemical characteristics.[4]
Electron microscopy soon after confirmed the physical structure of lysosomes.[4] Independent evolution of the vacuole is thought to have occurred multiple times, including within the Viridiplantae.[5]
What the research sources say
Aquaporins, which are proteins located in the tonoplast, regulate water movement into and out of the vacuole via active transport.[6][7] A cell will undergo plasmolysis if water loss causes a substantial drop in turgor pressure.[6][7] Cellular elongation and the upright support of plants both depend on the turgor pressure generated by vacuoles.[6][7] To protect the rest of the cell, toxic ions like strontium, cobalt(II), and lead(II) are moved into the vacuole.[8][9]
References
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Venes, "Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary", F.A. Davis Company, 2001, p. 2299; Schulz-Vogt, "Inclusions in Prokaryotes", 2006, p. 295–298 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Brooker, "Biology", McGraw-Hill, 2007, p. 79 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: van Leeuwenhoek, A. and Hoole, S. (1800) The Select Works of Antony Van Leeuwenhoek, Containing His Microscopical Discoveries in Many of the Works of Nature. Tr; "Observations et expériences faites sur les Animalicules des Infusions", L'École Polytechnique, 1776, p. 1920; "Histoire naturelle des zoophytes: Infusoires", Librairie Encyclopédique de Roret, 1841; "Grundzüge der wissenschaftlichen Botanik", W. Engelmann, 1842; "Plant Cell Biology: From Astronomy to Zoology", Elsevier/Academic Press, 2009, p. 101; "Plasmolytische Studien über die Wan en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: de Duve, C. (2005) The lysosome turns fifty. Nat. Cell Biol. 7, 847–849 CrossRef PubMed (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Becker B, "Function and evolution of the vacuolar compartment in green algae and land plants (Viridiplantae)", 2007, p. 1–24 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Taiz, "Plant Physiology", Sinauer, 2002, p. 13–14 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Open Library record, ISBN 0878938567 ("Plant Physiology"). CC0 (metadata); book content not read. openlibrary.org
- Wikipedia, "Vacuole" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "The fungal vacuole: composition, function, and biogenesis", Microbiological Reviews, September 1990, p. 266–92 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Open Library record, ISBN 9780123742636 ("International review of cytology"). CC0 (metadata); book content not read. openlibrary.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Vacuole (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Vacuole (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Word definitions: the , each quoted from its Wikipedia article.
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