Anatomy of the Heart

From just a matter of days following conception until death, the

beat goes on. In fact, throughout an average human life span,
the heart contracts about 3 billion times, never stopping except
for a fraction of a second to fi ll between beats. Within about
three weeks aft er conception, the heart of the developing embryo
starts to function. It is the fi rst organ to become functional.
At this time the human embryo is only a few millimeters
long, about the size of a capital letter on this page.
Why does the heart develop so early, and why is it so crucial
throughout life? It is this important because the circulatory
system is the bodys transport system. A human embryo, having
very little yolk available as food, depends on promptly establishing
a circulatory system that can interact with the mothers
circulation to pick up and distribute to the developing tissues
the supplies so critical for survival and growth. Th us begins the
story of the circulatory system, which continues throughout life
to be a vital pipeline for transporting materials on which the
cells of the body absolutely depend.
Th e circulatory system has three basic components:
1. Th e heart serves as the pump that imparts pressure to the
blood to establish the pressure gradient needed for blood to
fl ow to the tissues. Like all liquids, blood fl ows down a pressure
gradient from an area of higher pressure to an area of lower
pressure. Th is chapter focuses on cardiac physiology (cardia
means heart).
2. Th e blood vessels serve as the passageways through which
blood is directed and distributed from the heart to all parts of
the body and subsequently returned to the heart. Th e smallest
of the blood vessels are designed for rapid exchange of materials
between the surrounding tissues and the blood within the vessels
(see Chapter 10).
3. Blood is the transport medium within which materials being
transported long distances in the body (such as O 2, CO2,
nutrients, wastes, electrolytes, and hormones) are dissolved or
suspended (see Chapter 11).
Blood travels continuously through the circulatory system
to and from the heart through two separate vascular (blood
vessel) loops, both originating and terminating at the heart
( Figure 9-1). Th e pulmonary circulation consists of a closed
loop of vessels carrying blood between the heart and lungs

lung and the left lung; the systemic circulation

simultaneously loops through the upper half and
the lower half of the body.