How a body cell grows, copies its DNA, and splits into two identical daughter cells, and the four mitotic phases the HESI A2 expects you to name in order.
ObjectiveB.3.1Read4 minExam weightCell Division and Genetics ≈ 20% of Biology
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Name the two main parts of the eukaryotic cell cycle and what happens in each.
Put the four phases of mitosis in order and describe what a chromosome is doing in each.
Explain why cytokinesis is not itself a phase of mitosis.
What the lesson concludes
The cell cycle has two main divisions: interphase, where the cell grows and copies its DNA, and mitosis, where it divides that DNA between two new nuclei.
Mitosis runs in a fixed order: prophase, metaphase, anaphase, telophase, often remembered as PMAT.
DNA is copied once, during the S phase of interphase, never during mitosis itself.
Cytokinesis, the splitting of the cytoplasm into two daughter cells, overlaps with telophase but is a separate event from mitosis proper.
A somatic (body) cell that completes mitosis produces two daughter cells with the same chromosome number as the parent, unlike meiosis.