Y10 Blood Flashcards
What percentages is the blood made up of?
55% plasma, <1% white blood cell and platelets, and 45% red blood cells.
What does the plasma in your blood do?
It acts as a transport medium. It transports the blood and some other materials around the body: waste carbon dioxide, urea, and the small, soluble products of digestion.
What do red blood cells do?
They transport oxygen to every cell in the body.
What adaptations do red blood cells have?
They are biconcave discs to increase their surface area to volume ratio for diffusion, they’re packed with a red pigment called haemoglobin which binds to the oxygen, and they have no nucleus, making more space for haemoglobin.
What do white blood cells produce and do?
Lymphocytes form antibodies, some form antitoxins, phagocytes engulf viruses.
What are platelets?
Small fragments of cells without a nucleus.
What do platelets do?
They help blood to clot at the site of a wound.
