A scientist labels a group of cells in an early rabbit embryo and a group of cells inside the stem of a mature sunflower plant.
Over the next few days, while the rabbit is still an embryo, some cells produced from the labelled rabbit cells become nerve cells and others become muscle cells. Some cells produced from the labelled sunflower cells become xylem cells and others become phloem cells.
Which statement best explains why the two groups give similar results even though the sunflower plant is mature?
Most rabbit cells differentiate early in development, whereas many sunflower cells keep the ability to differentiate throughout the plant's life.
Sunflower cells can still differentiate because they have a cell wall, which rabbit cells do not have.
Sunflower cells only begin to differentiate once the plant is mature, whereas rabbit cells differentiate only in the embryo.
Rabbit cells and sunflower cells both keep the ability to differentiate throughout the organism's life.
282 exam-style questions on AQA GCSE Biology 1.1 Cell structure, covering 1.1.1 Eukaryotes and prokaryotes, 1.1.2 Animal and plant cells, 1.1.3 Cell specialisation, 1.1.4 Cell differentiation, 1.1.5 Microscopy, and 1.1.6 Culturing microorganisms. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.