Meet the Golgi Apparatus

While the endoplasmic reticulum and ribosomes are the organelles responsible for creating vital proteins, these proteins that are not ready to be used by an organism. Before the proteins can be sent off to different locations to perform their jobs, there is one organelle through which they must pass through first: the Golgi apparatus. The Golgi apparatus (or Golgi Complex, Golgi Body) is the organelle that sorts, modifies, packages, and ships proteins and lipids and proteins for secretion. It’s no wonder that the nickname of the Golgi apparatus is the “post office” of the cell! And if this weren’t enough, the Golgi apparatus helps create an important organelle in the cell used to degrade proteins, lipids, and more: lysosomes.

Note:  Studying the Golgi apparatus helps us understand a major theme found in biology: biological systems interact, and these systems and their interactions pose complex properties, and more specifically, the structure and function of subcellular components, and their interactions, provide essential cellular processes. (Biology Big Idea #4)


Sources:

Discovery of the Golgi Apparatus: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11624302

Golgi Apparatus (British Society for Cell Biology): http://bscb.org/learning-resources/softcell-e-learning/golgi-apparatus/