A while back the HPS adults listserv decided they wanted to study some of the problems associated with HPS in little, easy-to-understand chunks. The hope was that when we're at conference, we might have a better vocabulary and working understanding to better understand the presentations of the scientists.
This has turned out to be way harder to boil down than I ever could have imagined. Donna and I have worked on this for a few weeks.
At any rate, here's a very basic look at the anatomy of the overall lungs.
The Respiratory System
Lungs – the overall view
Oxygen is essential to the functioning of our bodies and it is the job of our lungs to make sure that our blood cells get all the oxygen they need.
We all have two lungs. The right lung is bigger than the left lung. The lungs are divided into sections called lobes. Each lung has an upper and lower lobe, and the bigger lung, the right one, also has a middle lobe. In between the lungs are our heart, the windpipe or trachea and some major blood vessels. Our lungs are positioned from the lowest part of your neck about where you can feel the first rib, down to where the ribs end. Separating your lungs from your stomach is a muscle called the diaphragm. A strong diaphragm can help you breathe better. Breathing exercises can strengthen your diaphragm.
Let’s take a tour of the lungs following the path the air takes as we breathe in. Think of the airways like an upside down cherry tree loaded down with cherries. We breathe air in through our nose and mouth into the “trunk” of the tree.
The air moves down our throat, through a windpipe called the trachea and into the bronchial tubes. The bronchial tubes are the place where the “trunk” of the tree breaks into two parts. One branch of the bronchial tube goes into one lung, and the other branch goes into the other lung. Each branch of the bronchial tubes then breaks off into 23 more branches, and each of those breaks off into even smaller and smaller branches.
Finally, when the branches are very, very tiny, they have clusters of round air sacs or “cherries” on the end of them. These cherries are called alveoli or alveolus (plural). We’ve got a LOT of these little cherries. The average adult lung has more than 150 million of them!
In the meantime, the heart pumps blood through blood vessels in the lung. These pulmonary arteries branch off into 6 billion tiny capillaries that surround the “cherries” (alveolus). This alveolar-capillary membrane is where gas is exchanged. Oxygen goes through to the capillary and carbon dioxide goes into the alveoli. Once the blood cells have picked up oxygen, they leave and go back to the heart through the pulmonary vein so that the heart can send the oxygen-loaded blood to the rest of the body. We’ll take another tour of the lungs following the route our blood cells take later and explain this process in greater detail then.
Section II – What about those cherries?
Coming soon....stay tuned.
This has turned out to be way harder to boil down than I ever could have imagined. Donna and I have worked on this for a few weeks.
At any rate, here's a very basic look at the anatomy of the overall lungs.
The Respiratory System
Lungs – the overall view
Oxygen is essential to the functioning of our bodies and it is the job of our lungs to make sure that our blood cells get all the oxygen they need.
We all have two lungs. The right lung is bigger than the left lung. The lungs are divided into sections called lobes. Each lung has an upper and lower lobe, and the bigger lung, the right one, also has a middle lobe. In between the lungs are our heart, the windpipe or trachea and some major blood vessels. Our lungs are positioned from the lowest part of your neck about where you can feel the first rib, down to where the ribs end. Separating your lungs from your stomach is a muscle called the diaphragm. A strong diaphragm can help you breathe better. Breathing exercises can strengthen your diaphragm.
Let’s take a tour of the lungs following the path the air takes as we breathe in. Think of the airways like an upside down cherry tree loaded down with cherries. We breathe air in through our nose and mouth into the “trunk” of the tree.
The air moves down our throat, through a windpipe called the trachea and into the bronchial tubes. The bronchial tubes are the place where the “trunk” of the tree breaks into two parts. One branch of the bronchial tube goes into one lung, and the other branch goes into the other lung. Each branch of the bronchial tubes then breaks off into 23 more branches, and each of those breaks off into even smaller and smaller branches.
Finally, when the branches are very, very tiny, they have clusters of round air sacs or “cherries” on the end of them. These cherries are called alveoli or alveolus (plural). We’ve got a LOT of these little cherries. The average adult lung has more than 150 million of them!
In the meantime, the heart pumps blood through blood vessels in the lung. These pulmonary arteries branch off into 6 billion tiny capillaries that surround the “cherries” (alveolus). This alveolar-capillary membrane is where gas is exchanged. Oxygen goes through to the capillary and carbon dioxide goes into the alveoli. Once the blood cells have picked up oxygen, they leave and go back to the heart through the pulmonary vein so that the heart can send the oxygen-loaded blood to the rest of the body. We’ll take another tour of the lungs following the route our blood cells take later and explain this process in greater detail then.
Section II – What about those cherries?
Coming soon....stay tuned.
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