Necrosis vs Apoptosis
Necrosis and apoptosis, do they look outlandish, you art not to blame. These are words from medical terminology that involve cell death and are often used by doctors. Before moving forward, let us know a little bit about cell death. It may sound odd, but death of cells is a natural phenomenon, and in fact necessary for human beings to develop and grow. There are billions of cells in our bodies such as brain cells, liver cells, bone cells, blood cells, and skin cells and so on. Apoptosis is a phenomenon of natural death of cells. This is a Greek word that means failing off. This type of death, which is considered natural and timely keeps everything inside the body in working order and in fact ensures that our bodies are not attacked by foreign invaders like bacteria and viruses. Some prefer to call apoptosis a suicide by cells.
There is another process known as necrosis, which is the opposite of apoptosis, and hence it would be appropriate to call it murder of cells rather than a suicide by cells on their own. Here, there is an outside cause of infection that results in death of cells. The infection or ailment causes a cell membrane to rupture and the DNA of the cell leaks out and spreads to other healthy cells that also get damaged in the process.
With everything taking place in a sequence and cells following their death sentence, apoptosis occurs naturally and everything seems to be in order. However, if some cells disobey and refuse to follow death sentence and refuse to die, they lead to cancerous formations, auto immune disease and other viral infections. On the other hand, if the rate of apoptosis is too high and cells die before their time, this also leads to many problems. This happens in the case of diseases such as AIDS, liver disease, Alzheimer’s disease and heart attacks.
Study of cell death through apoptosis and necrosis is a field where scientists learn a lot about cell behavior and their process of death which enables scientists to come up with treatments and cures of many diseases. In an average adult, 50 to 70 billion cells die on a daily basis due to apoptosis. And this is considered to be a healthy process. If one were to take the mass of dead cells in a year, it would be nearly equal to the weight of an individual. You may be surprised, but by the time in which you read this article, millions of cells in your own body chose to self destruct, and died. Did you feel anything!
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