One of the three large groups of organisms (apart from bacteria and archaeae), which have formed in the course of evolution.

Characteristic features of eukaryotes are cells composed in a complicated way of a cell nucleus and various cell organelles. Some of these organelles (in particular mitochondria and chloroplasts) developed from endosymbioses of the precursors of eukaryotes with certain bacteria. All multicellular organisms (all animals and plants) as well as some microogranisms (e.g. yeasts) are members of the eukaryotes. In contrast to this group, all organisms characterized by simple cells are named prokaryotes.