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Structure and Function of the Placenta

The placenta is a vital organ that facilitates the exchange of nutrients, oxygen, and waste between the mother and fetus while also functioning as an endocrine organ by secreting hormones to maintain pregnancy. It is a disc-like structure with villi that invade the uterine lining, allowing for the diffusion of materials without mixing maternal and fetal blood. The umbilical cord contains fetal arteries carrying deoxygenated blood and wastes, and a vein carrying oxygenated blood and nutrients back to the fetus.

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17 views1 page

Structure and Function of the Placenta

The placenta is a vital organ that facilitates the exchange of nutrients, oxygen, and waste between the mother and fetus while also functioning as an endocrine organ by secreting hormones to maintain pregnancy. It is a disc-like structure with villi that invade the uterine lining, allowing for the diffusion of materials without mixing maternal and fetal blood. The umbilical cord contains fetal arteries carrying deoxygenated blood and wastes, and a vein carrying oxygenated blood and nutrients back to the fetus.

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Widjaya HS Teacher
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313 The Placenta

427

Key Idea: The placenta allows materials to be exchanged specialized organ that performs this role, enabling exchange
between the fetus and its mother. It also acts as a temporary between fetal and maternal tissues and allowing a prolonged
endocrine organ, secreting hormones to maintain pregnancy. period of fetal growth and development within the uterus. The
The human fetus depends entirely on its mother for nutrients, placenta also has an endocrine role, producing progesterone
oxygen, and the elimination of wastes. The placenta is the and estrogen to maintain the pregnancy.

Schematic diagram showing part of the placenta in section


Section
enlarged right
Sinus filled with
maternal blood
Villus with
fetal arterioles
and venules
Cervix
Fetal tissue
Umbilical cord
Above: Fetus (near full term), Umbilical
showing placental attachment vein
and position in the uterus.

Below: Photograph of a human placenta,


just after delivery.
Umbilical
cord
0.3cc ,retneC lacideM mereK niE hassadaH

Umbilical Umbilical
cord arteries
Uterine Maternal Maternal
Boundary between fetal lining venule arteriole
Blood flow and maternal tissues
Exchange of wastes and nutrients via diffusion

The placenta is a disc-like organ, about the size of a dinner that oxygen and nutrients can diffuse from the maternal blood into
plate and weighing about 1 kg. It develops when fingerlike the capillaries of the villi. From the villi, the nutrients circulate in the
projections (villi) from the fetal membranes grow into the uterine umbilical vein, returning to the fetal heart. Carbon dioxide and other
lining. The villi contain the numerous capillaries connecting the wastes leave the fetus through the umbilical arteries, pass into the
fetal arteries and vein. They continue invading the maternal capillaries of the villi, and diffuse into the maternal blood. Note that
tissue until they are bathed in the maternal blood sinuses. The fetal blood and maternal blood do not mix: the exchanges occur via
maternal and fetal blood vessels are in such close proximity diffusion through thin walled capillaries.

1. Describe the structure and function of the human placenta:

2. The umbilical cord contains the fetal arteries and vein. Describe the status of the blood in each type of fetal vessel:
(a) Fetal arteries: Oxygenated and containing nutrients / Deoxygenated and containing nitrogenous wastes (delete one)
(b) Fetal vein: Oxygenated and containing nutrients / Deoxygenated and containing nitrogenous wastes (delete one)
3. Describe how substances are exchanged between the mother and the fetus:

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314 312 313
© 2012-2014 BIOZONE International
ISBN: 978-1-927173-93-0
Photocopying Prohibited
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