Cytokinesis (from the
Greek κύτος, "container" and κίνησις, "motion") is the
process during
cell division in which the
cytoplasm of a single
eukaryotic cell is divided to form two daughter cells. It usually initiates during the early stages of
mitosis, and sometimes
meiosis, splitting a mitotic
cell in two, to ensure that
chromosome number is maintained from one generation to the next. After cytokinesis two (daughter) cells will be formed that are exact copies of the (parent) original cell. It is formed After cytokinesis, each daughter cell is in the
interphase portion of the
cell cycle. In animal cells, one notable exception to the normal process of cytokinesis is
oogenesis (the creation of an
ovum in the
ovarian follicle of the
ovary), where the ovum takes almost all the cytoplasm and
organelles, leaving very little for the resulting
polar bodies, which then die. Another form of mitosis without cytokinesis occurs in the
liver, yielding
multinucleate cells. In plant cells, a dividing structure known as the
cell plate forms within the centre of the cytoplasm and a new
cell wall forms between the two daughter cells.