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The nephron is the functional unit of the kidney. [3] This means that each separate nephron is where the main work of the kidney is performed. A nephron is made of two parts: a renal corpuscle, which is the initial filtering component, and; a renal tubule that processes and carries away the filtered fluid. [4]: 1024
In contrast, the epithelium transitions to a simple squamous type in the thin segment, which is less metabolically active and has minimal surface specializations. The presence of aquaporin-1 channels in the thin segment facilitates high water permeability, crucial for water reabsorption as part of the kidney's countercurrent exchange mechanism .
Within the nephron of the kidney, the ascending limb of the loop of Henle is a segment of the heterogenous loop of Henle downstream of the descending limb, after the sharp bend of the loop. This part of the renal tubule is divided into a thin and thick ascending limb ; the thick portion is also known as the distal straight tubule , in contrast ...
Counter current multiplier diagram The loop of Henle is supplied by blood in a series of straight capillaries descending from the cortical efferent arterioles. These capillaries (called the vasa recta ; recta is from the Latin for "straight") also have a countercurrent multiplier mechanism that prevents washout of solutes from the medulla ...
Each nephron begins in a renal corpuscle, which is composed of a glomerulus enclosed in a Bowman's capsule. Cells, proteins, and other large molecules are filtered out of the glomerulus by a process of ultrafiltration , leaving an ultrafiltrate that resembles plasma (except that the ultrafiltrate has negligible plasma proteins ) to enter Bowman ...
The Bowman's capsule has an outer parietal layer composed of simple squamous epithelium. The visceral layer, composed of modified simple squamous epithelium, is lined by podocytes, podocyte foot processes (pedicels), that wrap around glomerular capillaries. These pedicels interdigitate with pedicels of adjacent podocytes forming filtration slits.
At this location, in the wall of the last portion of distal straight tubule, there is a modified region of tubular epithelium called the macula densa.(Fig. 5 in Kumaran and Hanukoglu 2020) [5] Cells in the macula densa respond to changes in the sodium chloride levels in the distal tubule of the nephron via the tubuloglomerular feedback (TGF) loop.
The microscopic structural and functional unit of the kidney is the nephron. It processes the blood supplied to it via filtration, reabsorption, secretion and excretion; the consequence of those processes is the production of urine. These include the nitrogenous wastes urea, from protein catabolism, and uric acid, from nucleic acid metabolism.