Expert: John Locke - 8/21/2008

Question
What types of cells are involved in each?
and What is the genetic make up of the final product of each?

Answer
Thanks for using AllExperts, Evelyn. Mitosis and meiosis are both fairly complex processes, and explaining them in enough detail would take both more room than I have here and the ability to use visuals, which I do not have here. As such, I'm going to direct you to what I think are fairly good online summaries of each process. If you have specific questions after reviewing these websites, I'd be happy to answer them.

Mitosis:
http://www.biology.arizona.edu/Cell_bio/tutorials/cell_cycle/cells3.html
http://www.purchon.com/biology/mitosis.htm
http://biology.about.com/od/mitosis/a/aa051206a.htm

Meiosis:
http://www.brown.edu/Courses/BI0032/gentherp/phaseIB1.html
http://www.phschool.com/science/biology_place/labbench/lab3/concepts2.html
http://www.biology.arizona.edu/CELL_BIO/tutorials/meiosis/main.html

Here are some things to keep in mind when studying mitosis and meiosis:

Mitosis and meiosis both involve cell duplication, but they are for very different purposes. Mitosis is used to replicate cells of the body, and it produces a full complement of DNA in the ending cell. There is exactly as much DNA at the end of mitosis as at the beginning. Meiosis is used for the production of reproductive cells, and the resulting cells have half as much DNA as the starting one. All body cells undergo mitosis, but only a specific complement of cells in the body are capable of undergoing meiosis.

Mitosis involves a single round of cell duplication in four stages, while meiosis includes two such duplications with eight stages. Mitosis is continuous; all organisms undergo mitosis from the moment of conception until they die. Meiosis is discontinuous: in people, for example, we don't start the bulk of meiosis until puberty, and it continues only for about 30 years or so.