Kidney

What Is A kidney?

The kidneys include two bean shaped glands located on each side of the spinal cord, behind the belly but below the ribs.  One kidney should be about the equivalent of a huge fist and measures about 4 to 5 inches in length.

The kidneys are where the filtration of blood happens. They eliminate waste, maintain the balance of body fluids, and maintain proper electrolyte balance. All throughout the day, all of the blood in a human body travels through kidneys.

The kidney is involved in regulation of bodily fluid quantity, osmolality, maintaining balance in acid and base, different electrolyte levels, and toxin elimination. 

Filtering takes place within glomerulus, which filters one-fifth of the volume of blood reaching both kidneys. Water that is solute free, salt, glucose as well as amino acids can be called as examples of compounds that are reabsorbed. The chemicals that are released are as follows: ammonium, hydrogen, potassium.

The kidney’s functional and structural unit is known as nephron . Every adult human’s kidney has roughly a whole million nephrons, as compared to a mouse that has around 12,000 nephrons.  The kidneys also perform duties that are not performed by the nephrons. They transform a vitamin D source to its active ingredient and produce the hormones erythropoietin and also rennin.

What Are The Important Functions Of The kidney?

One of the most important objectives of the kidneys’ is to eliminate waste materials and excess fluid from the body. The urine removes these waste materials as well as excessive fluid. Urine is made up of from a few series of some very intricate discharge and re-absorption processes. The procedure is needed to balance a steady chemical equilibrium in the body.

Some of the important functions of kidneys are explained below:

1. Filtration – Filtration is a process which occurs inside the renal corpuscle. It is a process through which cellular and larger proteins are being maintained and also the lower molecule elements are removed from the blood so that they can produce a more filtrate version, which is eventually converted to urine. Every day this process occurs and the kidney produces 180 liters of filtration. Because of the water pressure imposed along capillary walls, these procedures are also called hydrostatic filtration.
2. Reabsorption – The transfer of elements from the ultrafiltrate towards the peritubular capillary is usually known as reabsorption. Specific channels that are present on luminal cell membranes are used to achieve this. Inside the proximal tubule, water can be reabsorbed. Inside the proximal tubule, glucose gets entirely reabsorbed under typical plasma concentrations. The glucose cotransporter seems responsible for this to occur. The transporters will make the urine saturated, and then glucose gets eliminated which is present in the urine. 
3. Secretion – Secretion is a process that helps in transportation of elements from peritubular capillary via interstitial fluid, it then passes along renal tubular and goes towards the ultrafiltrate.
4. Excretion – The ultrafiltrate goes through the nephron and then passes along a tube that is called collecting duct, this collecting duct is a part of a system that is the collecting duct system. The collection channel is involved in reabsorption as well as carrying ultrafiltrate. This whole system is called the process of excretion.
5. Hormone secretion – Vitamin D is required by the human body for a variety of tasks. The majority of vitamin D in our bloodstream stays inactive, and it is energised mostly by kidneys and some other tissues. Active form of vitamin D aids with the absorption of calcium from a diet, as well as maintaining the bones and keeping them strong. It also helps in the regulation of the immune system and its response to an infection.
6. Osmolality – Whenever the human body’s osmotic concentration rises, the body produces antidiuretic hormone (ADH). It’s a hormone that instructs the kidneys so they retain greater water percentage in your blood vessels, and making the urine more concentrated. If the human body’s osmolality drops, then the body produces less ADH. The body’s blood and urine concentration gets more diluted as a result of this.

In short, the glomerulus is a network of tiny blood arteries in the kidneys, filters blood. This creates a liquid, which is subsequently passed via the nephrons. Components that the body needs such as proteins are reabsorbed by the whole process to the bloodstream when this liquid flows along the nephron. Waste materials, alcohol residues, are preserved with the said fluid and excreted as urine.

Conclusion:

This article sheds light on a human organ that is called kidney and helps in assisting the readers by explaining the functions of a kidney. The kidney is one of the most important parts of the human body and needs to be studied in a more detailed view to have a complete picture of what it does for an organism but this article touches on the most important functions of a kidney and covers all the basic functions that needs to be known regarding human kidneys.