Blood Plasma

Plasma: The liquid part of the blood.

Blood, the medium by which materials are transported between different parts of the body, is
made up of a liquid, plasma, (55%) and blood cells (45%).
- Plasma is 90% water and 10% chemicals which are dissolved or suspended in it.
- Plasma transport nutrients, along with heat, from where they are produced or absorbed to
where cells can use or excrete them.
- Chemicals in the plasma include:
Nutrients (e.g. glucose, amino acids, vitamins)
Waste products (e.g. urea)
Mineral salts (e.g. calcium salts, iron salts)
Hormones (e.g. insulin, adrenalin)
Plasma proteins (e.g. fibrinogen, prothrombin, albumin)
Respiratory gases (e.g. O2, CO2)
- Plasma - proteins involved in clotting (prothrombin and fibrinogen) = serum
Serum does not clot.
Tissue Fluid
Tissue fluid: the liquid bathing cells, similar to blood plasma but containing no cells and few blood
proteins.
Tissue fluid has the function of facilitating the exchange of substances between the blood and
the cells in the tissues.
- Tissue fluid contains glucose, amino acids, fatty acids, salts, and oxygen which it supplies to
tissues.
- Tissue fluid receives CO2 and waste products from the tissues.
- Thus, tissue fluid has less oxygen and glucose than plasma, but more CO2.
The formation of tissue fluid:

- Blood pumped by the heart passes along the arteries, then into arterioles and finally into
capillaries (all decreasing in lumen size). This creates a hydrostatic pressure at the arterial
end of the capillaries which tends to push the liquid out of the blood.
This outward pressure is opposed by two forces:
1. The hydrostatic pressure of the tissue fluid outside the capillaries.
2. The lower water potential of the blood due to plasma proteins that pulls water
back into the capillaries.
- The overall pressure created is able to push plasma out of the capillaries to form the tissue
fluid. The pressure is just enough to force small molecules out of the capillaries, leaving all
cells and proteins in the blood.
This type of filtration under pressure is called ultrafiltration.
Some white blood cells can squeeze through and move freely in the tissue fluid.
- The loss of tissue fluid reduces the pressure in the capillaries. Thus, by the time blood
reaches the venous end of the network, the hydrostatic pressure is less than that of the tissue
fluid outside it so, tissue fluid is drawn back into the capillaries.
Along with the lower water potential, due to proteins in the plasma, there is also an overall
negative pressure drawing tissue fluid back into the capillaries.
This fluid has lost much of its oxygen and nutrients by diffusion to the cells it surrounds
and has gained CO2 and excretory products.
Lymph
Lymphatic system: A network of fine lymph capillaries throughout the body of a vertebrate, draining
lymph and returning it to the blood circulation.
Since not all the tissue fluid can return to the capillaries, the remainder must be carried back via
the lymphatic system by means of a series of tubes known as lymph vessels or lymphatics.
- Lymphatics are tiny blind-ending vessels found in almost all tissues of the body.
They have tiny valves which allow tissue fluid to flow in but not out. These valves are large
enough to allow large proteins, which are too big to get into the blood capillaries, to pass
through.
- If the protein concentration and rate of loss from the plasma are not in balance with the
protein concentration and rate of loss from the tissue fluid, there can be a build up of tissue
fluid called oedema.
- Lymph is virtually identical to tissue fluid.
In some tissues lymph and tissue fluid are different from that in other tissues:
- In the liver they have a high concentration of protein.
- In the walls of the small intestine after a meal there is a high concentration of lipids.
- Lymphatics join up to form larger lymph vessels called the thoracic duct ( into which most of
the lymph from the left side of the body drains) and the right lymphatic duct (which receives
the rest).
These vessels return the lymph to the blood via the left and right subclavian veins.
- Along the lymph vessels there are lymph nodes which produce and store lymphocytes (some
of which produce antibodies).
As lymph passes through these nodes, lymphocytes and proteins are added to it.
Lymph nodes filter from the blood any bacteria and other foreign materials which are then
engulfed by phagocytes.
Thus, lymph nodes swell with dead cells and this accounts for the tenderness often felt in
the armpits and neck during an infection.
Lymph moves along the lymph vessels in three ways:
1. Hydrostatic pressure of tissue fluid leaving the capillaries pushes it.
2. Contraction of body muscles squeezes the lymph vessels and valves insure that the fluid
inside them moves away from the tissues to the heart.
3. Enlargement of the thorax during inspiration reduces pressure in the thorax, drawing lymph
into this region.
Blood
Blood is a specialised tissue consisting of several types of cells suspended in a fluid medium,
plasma. There is about 5 decimetres of blood in the human body.

 The cellular constituents of blood are:

1. Red blood cells (RBC) = erythrocytes
2. White blood cells (WBC) = leucocytes
3. Platelets
Red
blood cells

- Structure in relation to function:

They are shaped like a biconcave disk. The dent in each side of the RBC increases the
surface area : volume ratio of the cell so O2 can diffuse quickly into and out of the cell.
They are unusual in having no nucleus, mitochondria, rough endoplasmic reticulum, or Golgi
body when they mature, which makes them more efficient in the role of transporting oxygen
because:
1. They are much thinner in the middle.
2. They are small (7m in diameter) and flexible so they can pass through narrow
capillaries and can flatten against the capillary walls, reducing the distance across
which diffusion takes place.
3. There is more room for the pigment haemoglobin (Hb) which carries O2.
- RBCs live around 120 days. In adult humans, in order of maintain their number, the bone
marrow of certain bones (cranium, sternum, vertebrae, and ribs) need to make over 2 million
RBCs per second.
- The dead RBCs are destroyed in the spleen.
White blood cells
- They all contain a nucleus and are either spherical or irregular in shape. Most are larger than
RBCs.
- Unlike RBCs, leucocytes can pass out of the blood vessels into tissue fluid.
- They are made in the bone marrow of limb bones.
- They function to protect the body agains infections (immune response).
- They are divided into two groups based on how they carry out their function:
1. Phagocytes: Remove microorganisms, dead cells, by phagocytosis.
Neutrophils have a multi-lobed nucleus and granular cytoplasm.
Monocytes have a kidney-shaped nucleus, no granular cytoplasm, and become
macrophages.
2. Lymphocytes: They act against microorganisms. Some of them called B-lymphocytes,
secrete antibodies. They immobilise and kill microorganisms and make them ready for
phagocytes to engulf.
- Each type of lymphocyte acts against one particular pathogen so they are specific.
- They are smaller than phagocytes, have large a round nucleus and small amounts
of cytoplasm.
Platelets

- They are fragments of cells shaped like flattened disks which arise in bone marrow.
- They have a lifespan of 5 to 7 days.
- They circulate in the blood until the detect damage to a blood vessel. Very quickly they
become sticky and change their shape to spheres with long projections. Then, they stick to
the damaged surface of the blood vessel.