Final answer:
The endosomal maturation from an early endosome to a late endosome typically takes minutes to hours involving the sorting of internalized materials and their eventual digestion by lysosomal enzymes.
Step-by-step explanation:
The time frame of endosomal maturation, from an early endosome to a late endosome, can vary but is generally in the order of minutes to hours. Once a substance is internalized by the cell through endocytosis, it is enclosed within a clathrin-coated vesicle. The clathrin coating is then lost and the vesicle fuses with an early endosome. The early endosome sorts the internalized material; some of the material may be recycled back to the plasma membrane, while the remaining contents are delivered to the late endosome, followed by the lysosome.
In the lysosome, digestive enzymes catalyze the hydrolysis of the material, a process that can take several hours. The digested products are then released for use within the cell. Thus, the entire process of endocytosis to lysosomal degradation encompasses early and late stages of the endosome lifecycle.