Cell Biology Basics

Cell Biology

• Cell biology is the science that studies the cell, the unit of composition and function in living organisms.

Discovery of the Microscope

• The microscope was invented by Antony Van Leeuwenhoek, a Dutch tradesman and amateur scientist.
• Leeuwenhoek's improved microscope enabled him to see things that no man had ever seen before, including bacteria, yeast, blood cells, and tiny animals swimming in a drop of water.

Cell Structure

• A cell is the smallest unit of a living thing.
• A living thing, whether made of one cell (like bacteria) or many cells (like a human), is called an organism.
• Cells vary in size and cannot be seen with the naked eye, so scientists use microscopes to study them.
• A microscope is an instrument that magnifies an object, and photographs of the cell are taken with a microscope, called micrographs.