Name: Human Respiratory System
Uploaded: 2019-07-19
Duration: 4 min 39 s
Description: Fishes need gills for respiration, while frogs have skin as one of their respiratory organs. Check out this video for details about the respiratory organs in humans.

Question

Describe the structure and functioning of the nephron.

Accepted Answer

Nephrons are the functional units of the kidney. They purify the blood and produce urine. Each kidney has approximately 1-1.5 million nephrons in it.

The following are the main components of the nephron:
i) Glomerulus- It is a tuft of capillaries, located at the beginning of a nephron in the kidney that filter the blood passing through it and initiate urine formation.
ii) Bowman's capsule- It is a double-walled cup-like structure that is present at the nephron’s tabular end, encapsulating glomerulus in it.
iii) Long renal tubule- It is a long and convoluted structure that emerges from the glomerulus.

The functioning of a nephron-

The kidney receives urea containing blood through the renal artery which enters to the glomerulus. During the filtration in the glomerulus, substances like glucose, amino acids, urea, salts, water, etc., present in the blood pass into the Bowman's capsule and then enter the tubule of the nephron.

When the filtrate containing useful substances as well as the waste substances passes through the tubule, then the useful substances like glucose, amino acids, salts, and water, etc., are reabsorbed into the blood through blood capillaries.

The waste substances like urea, some unwanted salts and excess water remain behind in the tubule, which is called as urine. The nephron carries this urine into the collecting duct of the kidney from where it is carried to the ureter.

Describe the structure and functioning of the nephron.

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