Mitosis

Mitosis is the process by which a eukaryotic cell separates the chromosomes in its cell nucleus into two identical sets, in two separate nuclei. It is a form of karyokinesis, or nuclear division. Itis generally followed immediately by cytokinesis, which divides the nuclei, cytoplasm, organelles, and cell membrane into two cells containing roughly equal shares of these cellularcomponents.[1] Mitosis and cytokinesis together define the mitotic (M) phase of the cell cycle—thedivision of the mother cell into two daughter cells, genetically identical to each other and to their parent cell. Thisaccounts for approximately 10% of the cell cycle.
Mitosis occurs only in eukaryotic cells and the process varies in different species. For example, animals undergo an "open" mitosis, where the nuclearenvelope breaks down before the chromosomes separate, while fungi such as Aspergillus nidulans and Saccharomyces cerevisiae (yeast) undergo a "closed" mitosis, where chromosomes divide within anintactcell nucleus.[2] Prokaryotic cells, which lack a nucleus, divide by a process called binary fission.

Cytokinesis, from the greek cyto- (cell) and kinesis (motion, movement), is the process inwhich the cytoplasm of a single eukaryotic cell is divided to form two daughter cells. It usually initiates during the late stages of mitosis, and sometimes meiosis, splitting a mitotic cell in two, toensure that chromosome number is maintained from one generation to the next. In animal cells, one notable exception to the normal process of cytokinesis is oogenesis (the creation of an ovum inthe ovarian follicle of the ovary), where the ovum takes almost all the cytoplasm and organelles, leaving very little for the resulting polar bodies, which then die. In plant cells, a dividing structure knownas the cell plate forms across the centre of the cytoplasm and a new cell wall forms between the two daughter cells. the
Cytokinesis is distinguished from the prokaryotic process of binary...