Topic 9: Liver - Detoxification Flashcards
Where is the liver located?
It is located under the rib cage and more to the right.
Desribe the internal anatomy of the liver
Liver is divided into liver lubules containing:
- central vein, removing blood from the liver
- portal triad, bringing blood to the liver and removing bile
Describe the structure of portal triad
The portal triad has 3 blood vessels
- hepatic artery: bring O2 rich and high nutritious blood from heart to liver
- hepatic portal vein: bring blood from guts to liver
- hepatic duct: collecting bile made by the liver and join with cystic duct to form common bile duct in which bile is released to duodenum or stored in the gallbladder
Describe the movement of blood and bile inside the liver
- Blood moves from the portal triad across the tubules aligned with hepatocytes, cells performaing functions of liver, towards the central vein.
- Bile moves towards portal triad and away from liver
Describe how the liver moderates glucose level in blood
Liver stores glucose as glycogen and is the only organ actually making glucose from glycogen during fasting period.
Insulin and glucagon assist in those processes.
Describe the function of cholesterol and how it can build up in blood vessels
Cholesterol helps maintaining the integrity of the cell membrane and building hormones
Cholesterol cannot mix with water, so it can easily separates itself from the bloodstream and deposit on the vessels walls
Describe how the liver maintain cholesterol balance
Liver produces carrier proteins which carry cholesterol away and to the liver in “packages”
- High density lipoprotein: good cholesterol, brining cholesterol from vessels to liver
- Low density lipoprotein: bad cholesterol, bringing cholesterol from liver to vessels
What are the functions of albumin and coagulation factors?
- Albumun helps maintaining blood osmolarity by preventing water leeking out of blood vessels and also transfering water-insoluable molecules
- Coagulation factors: responsible for wound healing by a cascade of reactions, most of which involve proteins mostly made by liver
Describe the role of liver in amino acids metabolism
The liver creates most non-essential amino acids and also breaks down them to repackage into urea
How does the liver maintain a balanced pH level?
- Urea synthesis takes up bicarbonate
- Produces ketones (ketogenesis): lowers blood pH
- Metabolising lactic acid and converts 70% of it back to glucose
What does liver do towards consumption of drugs or regulate neurotransmitters and hormones?
Liver helps to neutralize neurotransmitters, hormones, and drugs by removing it after being released to prevent accumulation.
What substances people consume a lot that liver can help to break down?
Liver helps to break down caffein and alcohole through many steps.
How does the liver help “filter and clean” the blood?
Specialised cells in the liver can destroy bacteria and viruses as well as old red blood cells
How does the liver maintain iron balance?
Which process is this similar to?
Most iron is stored in ferritin - a protein basket - inside the liver.
To maintain blood iron availability, iron can be controllably released into trasferrin.
This is similar to copper homeostasis.
Describe the functions of bile/gall
- Assists in break down fat in gut
- Acts as a surfactant, making fat easily mixed with water
Bile doesn’t have enzymes, so there is no enzymic activity in helping with fat digestion.
- Akline, balance stomach acid
