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CIRCULATORY SYSTEM
Sunday, November 15, 2020

• Understand why many animals have a

heart and circulation

• Explain how the circulatory system helps

in effective transport in the body
• Highlight other functions of the
circulatory system

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TRUST

‫وا إِن ُكنتُم‬ ْ ُ‫• َوقَا َل ُمو َسى يَا قَ ْو ِم إِن ُكنتُ ْم آ َمنتُم بِاهّلل ِ فَ َعلَ ْي ِه تَ َو َّكل‬
َ ‫ُّم ْسلِ ِم‬
‫ين‬
• And Moses said: "O my people! If you
believe in God, place your trust in Him
-if you have [truly] surrendered
yourselves unto Him!" 

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Why need a transport system?
Single-celled organisms, such as bacteria and amoeba
(below), can obtain nutrients and excrete waste simply by
diffusion.

nutrients waste products

Multi-cellular organisms, such as insects, fish and mammals,

require a more specialized transport system. Why is this?

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Surface area to volume ratio
In larger organisms,
diffusion of substances
would occur far too
slowly to enable them
to survive: the rate of
diffusion increases
with the square of the
distance it has to
travel.
This is not just because of its size, however: more important
is an organism’s surface area to volume ratio.
Single-celled organisms have a very large surface area to
volume ratio, because the diffusion path is so short.

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Surface area and volume

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Features of mass transport system

• Vascularised
• Directional
• Fast
• Exchange surfaces
• Adaptable

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Components of circulatory systems
Multi-cellular animals overcome the limitations of diffusion by
having a specialized circulatory system. This comprises:

 a heart
 a fluid in which substances are transported
 vessels through which the fluid can flow.

The two types of

circulatory system are
open (e.g. molluscs,
arthropods) and
closed (e.g.
vertebrates, a few
invertebrates).

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What is blood?
Blood is a specialized
transport medium that is also
considered a special type of
connective tissue. An average
adult has 4–6 litres of blood.

Blood has a range of

functions such as:

 transport
 defence
 thermoregulation
 maintaining pH of body fluids.

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Open circulatory systems
An open circulatory system consists of a heart that pumps a
fluid called haemolymph through short vessels and into a
large cavity called the haemocoel.

In the haemocoel, the

haemolymph directly bathes heart
organs and tissues, enabling
the diffusion of substances.
haemocoel
When the heart relaxes, the
haemolymph blood is sucked
back in via pores called ostia.

Haemolymph moves around the haemocoel due to the

movement of the organism.

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Closed circulatory systems
In a closed circulatory system, blood is fully enclosed
within blood vessels at all times.

From the heart, blood is

pumped through a series heart
of progressively smaller
vessels. In the smallest
vessels, capillaries, capillaries
substances diffuse in and
out of the blood and into
cells.

Blood then returns to the heart via a series of progressively

larger vessels.

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 If blood is separated it no longer looks
like the red liquid that we recognise.

Centrifuge

The blood sample separates into two parts.

The top half is a straw coloured liquid called Plasma (55%).

The bottom half is a dark collection of Blood cells (45%).

Closed circulatory systems

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The mammalian circulatory system

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Why do we need a blood system

• To supply Oxygen
• To supply Glucose
• To get rid of the waste products
To and from all parts of the body
• Carrying hormones
• Forming part of defence system
• Distributing heat

A SPECIALISED TRANSPORT SYSTEM OR BLOOD

SYSTEM

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Circulation: true or false?

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