I/ PLANT CELLS AND ANIMAL CELLS OBSERVATION

1/- Introduction: Should be short and general, max 150 words.

2/- Procedure: What did you do? Max 50 words.
3/- Results: Identify cellular membrane, nucleus and cytoplasm.

1. Introduction:
Observation of Plant Cell:
An onion is a multicellular (consisting of many cells) plant organism. As in all plant cells,
the cell of an onion peel consists of a cell wall, cell membrane, cytoplasm, nucleus and a
large vacuole. The nucleus is present at the periphery of the cytoplasm. The vacuole is
prominent and present at the centre of the cell. It is surrounded by cytoplasm. The presence of
a cell wall and a large vacuole are indicators that help identify plant cells, such as seen in the
onion peel.
Observation of Animal Cell:
As in all animal cells, the cells of the human cheek do not possess a cell wall. A cell
membrane that is semi-permeable surrounds the cytoplasm. Unlike plant cells, the cytoplasm
in an animal cell is denser, granular and occupies a larger space. The vacuole in an an animal
cell is smaller in size, or absent. The nucleus is present at the centre of the cytoplasm. The
absence of a cell wall and a prominent vacuole are indicators that help identify animal cells,
such as cells seen in the human cheek.
2. Procedure:
To observe plant cells under a microscope:
1. Remove a piece of an onion leaf from a section of an onion bulb.
2. Break the piece of onion leaf into half. So that, the outer epidermis layer should be
easy to separate from the rest of the leaf.
3. Place the epidermis layer flat on a slide. Wrinkles will trap air bubbles and
obscure your observations.
4. Add a drop of water/Lugol solution and cover with a coverslip.
5. Observe your slide with your microscope.

To observe animal cells under a microscope:

1. Gently scrape the inside of your cheek with the broad end of a toothpick.
2. Smear your cheek scrapings on a clean slide. Wrap your toothpick in a dry paper
towel and immediately dispose it into the waste-container provided.
3. Make a wet mount of your cheek cells by adding a drop of water/Lugol solution
to the slide.
4. Add a coverslip and observe the slide at very low light intensity.
 5. When you locate some cheek cells, at 4x objective lense center them in the field
of view and move to the next power level (10x) for observation. Re-focus and
center your cheek cells and then view them with the high power (40x and 100x)
objective lens.

3. Result:
Plant cells:
 There are a large number of regularly shaped cells lying side by side and each cell has
a distinct cell wall.
 A distinct nucleus is present on the periphery of each cell.
 A large vacuole is present at the centre of each cell, and is surrounded by the
cytoplasm.

Animal cells:
 The cells do not have a cell wall. However, each cell has a thin cell membrane.
 A deeply stained nucleus is observed at the centre of each cell.
 No prominent vacuoles are observed in the cells.

Sample of plant cell

Sample of animal cell.