Term | Definition |
biology | the science of life or living matter in all its forms and phenomena, especially with reference to origin, growth, reproduction, structure, and behavior. |
organization | the act or process of organizing. |
cell | a usually microscopic structure containing nuclear and cytoplasmic material enclosed by a semipermeable membrane and, in plants, a cell wall; the basic structural unit of all organisms. |
unicellular | having or consisting of a single cell. |
multicellular | composed of several or many cells. |
organ | a grouping of tissues into a distinct structure, as a heart or kidney in animals or a leaf or stamen in plants, that performs a specialized task. |
tissue | an aggregate of similar cells and cell products forming a definite kind of structural material with a specific function, in a multicellular organism. |
organelle | a specialized part of a cell having some specific function; a cell organ. |
homeostasis | the maintenance of metabolic equilibrium within an animal by a tendency to compensate for disrupting changes |
metabolism | the sum of the physical and chemical processes in an organism by which its material substance is produced, maintained, and destroyed, and by which energy is made available.
Compare anabolism, catabolism. |
cell division | the division of a cell in reproduction or growth. |
development | the act or process of developing; growth; progress: |
reproduction | the natural process among organisms by which new individuals are generated and the species perpetuated. |
gene | the basic physical unit of heredity; a linear sequence of nucleotides along a segment of DNA that provides the coded instructions for synthesis of RNA, which, when translated into protein, leads to the expression of hereditary character. |