Different Kinds of Death

As living creatures, we tend to see death though a lens of complex feelings.  There's fear, revulsion, acceptance, and resistance all mixed in with several other shades of emotions.  But when you look at cell death, there can be a beautiful clarity found on the cellular scale.

Particularly, I mean to reference the difference in neuronal die-off between apoptosis and necrosis.

Let's start with the more intimidatingly named one.  Necrosis is pretty much exactly what it sounds like.  "Necro" has its latin roots in the death.  It's never a good thing to have unexpected cell death which is exactly what necrosis is.  It starts due to external damage to the cell which causes a disturbance in the cell membrane.  There are multiple ways this is accomplished but the end result is always a rupture in the cell walls and that cell "spilling its guts" into the extracellular matrix.  This changes the composition of the fluid surrounding the other cells in the tissue and can lead to a massive bystander effect.  Part of what makes brain hemorrhages so dangerous is this cascade of cell deaths and the damage they deal to their neighbors.

No mess death!

Apoptosis, on the other end, is a purposeful, regulated cellular destruction.  The name comes from the latin meaning "to fall away."  And in truth, that's really what these cells are doing.  Because believe it or not, our bodies produce too many cells in the early stages of development but then has to find a way to get rid of this extra baggage.  Apoptosis is the biological answer to the problem.  Cells receive an external signal which essentially sets a self-destruct sequence.  Because the process is controlled, there are no unwanted exterior effects.

So with these new vocabulary in my mind, I think I've decided I'l never die.  I'll just "apoptize."