Cell analogy to a car repair shop?

Lester Haschke: Hmmm... I've heard a lot of analogies, but this is the first time I've thought about a cell as a mechanic's shop.The nucleus is where a lot of stuff is controlled, and where the "blueprints" for proteins are stored, so it would be like the main office.The endoplasmic reticulum and golgi are where proteins are made. You could look at them as the machine shop, where mechanics can fabricate new parts.The mitochondria is where fuel is broken down and used to make useful packets of energy. Maybe a generator, if the repair shop wasn't connected to the city's power grid, or was in the middle of nowhere.The lysosomes are where cell components go to be broken down. You could look at it as the dumpster out back, or an incinerator. It's a little tricky, though, because the lysosomes break down unwanted stuff, but the remains usually get recycled.The cytoskeleton can be pretty straightforward - it's the structure that holds the shop together. It's more than just a ske! leton, though. It's used as sort of a "railway" where transport proteins can pull vesicles and organelles around inside the cell. So in the mechanic's shop analogy, it would be like support beams, but with rails and trolleys along them so you could hang heavy stuff by a chain and easily pull them around in the shop....Show more