What is Golgi Apparatus?

The Golgi apparatus is a central organelle found in eukaryotic cells. It was first discovered by Camillo Golgi in 1898. It is characterized by stacked membrane sacs known as cisternae. These cisternae are stacked on top of each other to form the Golgi complex. The Golgi complex is mostly found near the nucleus. The Golgi apparatus is made up of approximately four to eight cisternae, although in some single-celled organisms, it may consist of as many as 60 cisternae. Golgi consists of cis and trans faces.

The cis face receives material from the endoplasmic reticulum, and the trans face releases vesicles carrying processed substances to various cellular organs. Animal cells generally contain around 10 to 20 Golgi stacks per cell, which are connected by tubular connections. The plant cells contain many freely distributed subunits of the Golgi Apparatus, called dictyosomes. The Golgi body is not present in bacteria, blue-green algae, mature sperms, and red blood cells of mammals and other animals.

Golgi apparatus is an organelle found in most of the eukaryotes. It consists of a series of flattened membrane sacs called cisternae. These cisternae are present one over the other to form the Golgi complex. It is responsible for packaging proteins into vesicles before secretion and therefore plays a key role in the secretory pathway.

The various functions performed by the Golgi apparatus are: it modifies and processes lipids for cellular use, contributes to the formation of lysosomes for cellular waste management and modifies protein by adding carbohydrates and phosphate groups to proteins. In this article, we will study the Golgi apparatus and diagram its structure, and functions in detail.