How the CIRCULATORY SYSTEM

Works

About the Cover

The cover is a color-enhanced picture taken by a scanning electron microscope of a cast of one small vein, a sn1all artery, and a number of capillaries. A cast is a model of the space inside vessels (or other hollow organs and tissues); here it is what was left over after the vessels were injected with a special polymeric material and all the tissues were removed by various corrosive means. Be assured this cast was not derived from human tissue.

With the gracious permission of the author and the publisher, this picture is reproduced from Figure 1.11 on page 143 of Microvascular Corrosion Casting in Scanning Electron Microscopy: Techniques and Applications, written by S. H. Aharinejad and A. Lametschwandtner and published by Springer-Verlag in 1992.

How the CIRCULATORY SYSTEM

Works

ROBERT E. MEHLER, MD

LAUREN SOMPAYRAC, PhD

b Blackwell Science

© 2001 by Blackwell Science, Inc.

Editorial Offices: Commerce Place, 350 Main Street, Malden, Massachusetts 02148, USA Osney Mead, Oxford OX2 OEL, England 25 John Street, London WC1N 2BL, England 23 Ainslie Place, Edinburgh EH3 6AJ, Scotland 54 University Street, Carlton, Victoria 3053, Australia

Other Editorial Offices: Blackwell Wissenschafts-Verlag GmbH, Kurfurstendamm 57, 10707 Berlin, Germany Blackwell Science KK, MG Kodenmacho Building, 7-10 Kodenmacho Nihombashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104, Japan

Distributors:

USA

Canada

Blackwell Science, Inc. Commerce Place 350 Main Street Malden, Massachusetts 02148 (Telephone orders: 800-215-1000 or 781-388-8250; fax

orders: 781-388-8270)

Login Brothers Book Company 324 Saulteaux Crescent Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3J 3T2 (Telephone orders: 204-837-2987)

Australia Blackwell Science Pty, Ltd. 54 University Street Carlton, Victoria 3053 (Telephone orders: 03-9347-0300; fax orders: 03-9349-3016)

Outside North America and Australia Blackwell Science, Ltd. c I o Marston Book Services, Ltd. P.O. Box 269 Abingdon Oxon OX14 4YN England (Telephone orders: 44-01235-465500; fax orders: 44-01235-465555)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Acquisitions: Chris Davis Development: Julia Casson Production: Erin Whitehead Manufacturing: Lisa Flanagan Director of Marketing: Lisa Larsen Marketing Manager: Toni Fournier Cover design by Meral Dabcovich, VisPer

The Blackwell Science logo is a trade mark of Blackwell Science Ltd., registered at the United Kingdom Trade Marks Registry

Figure credits: p. 66-Source: Alexander RW, Schlant RC, Fuster V, eds. Hurst's The Heart. 1998. Reproduced with permission of the McGraw-Hill Companies.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Mehler, Robert E. How the circulatory system works I by Robert E. Mehler.

p. em. -- (How it works) ISBN 0-86542-548-5 1. Cardiovascular system. 2. Blood--Circulation. I. Series.

QP10l.M456 2000 512.1--dc21

00-039753

DEDICATION

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I must begin by thanking Lauren.Sompayrac for making it pOssible for me to wri this book, then for encouraging me -to do it, and finally for reading-and c m.m· · ting on it additional w nderful n _ fit spa k d by thi -project has been .great cam d that .my w~ , artcy, arid I no have with Lauren and his wife, Vicki.

· Diane Lorenz has done great work in preparing the ill~ trations. How can anyon so good at her ork be s0 ni~e? ·

v

E eryone at Blackwell Science, Inc., has been · rery helpful. Am ng them, Chri Da is, Erin Whitehead, Julia Casson, and Irene Herlihy tand out. ·. · ·

. - o· em t,I thank m ife, ancy Aldridge Mehler, for her help . . Her .~ rt transcribing and gentle diting made this h<>Ok possibl . Sh¢ was ble to take my ,h d-pril1ted · material - crea ely formed letters and lin in . arying g .. metric pattem - and tum it into actual blocked paragraphs with lines that read 1 ft to :r~ght. She is 'for this . book ( fOr me) a ~~~ ' ' '

',_.

With such help this book could be perfect. Where it · n't, it is my own doing.

vii

CONTENTS

How to Use This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Lecture 1. An Overview of the Circulatory System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Lecture 2. The Heart ................ · ... ~ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Lecture 3. The Arteries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Lecture 4. The Capillaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Lecture 5. The Vein ................................................................ 45

Lecture 6. The Blood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Lechtre 7. Special Circulations ................ ....................... . ............. ... 53

Lecture 8. Coupling Heart and Vessels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Lecture 9. Diseases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Lecture 10. Exercise: The Final Kick ................................................... 75

Glossary ............... , . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

Index ........ . ... ........................ . ................ ~ ......................... 81