Zoology · Ch 2 — Human Reproduction
Female Reproductive System: Ovaries and Duct System
Female Reproductive System: Ovaries and Duct System
The ovaries are the primary female sex organs — a pair of elliptical bodies, roughly 2-4 cm long, sitting one on each side of the lower abdomen and held in place by a ligament called the mesovarium. Each ovary is covered by a thin germinal epithelium overlying a dense connective-tissue capsule, the tunica albuginea, and its interior stroma is split into an outer cortex, dense and granular because it is packed with ovarian follicles at every stage of development, and an inner medulla, a looser tissue rich in blood vessels, lymphatics and nerves. A pair of fallopian tubes (also called uterine tubes or oviducts) run from each ovary to the uterus. Each tube starts with a funnel-shaped infundibulum whose finger-like fimbriae sweep up the ovum after ovulation, widens into the ampulla (the usual site of fertilisation), and narrows into a short, thick-walled isthmus that joins the uterus. The uterus (womb) itself is a thick-walled, muscular, richly vascular, inverted-pear-shaped organ lying between the bladder and the rectum. Its main body has a rounded upper region, the fundus, and it narrows below into the cervix, whose canal opens into the vagina; together the cervical canal and vagina form the birth canal. The uterine wall has three tissue layers: the thin outer perimetrium, the thick muscular myometrium (which contracts powerfully duri …
What this figure shows. A side (sagittal) view of the female pelvis showing the ovary and uterine (fallopian) tube at the back connecting to the uterus, which sits between the urinary bladder in front and the rectum behind; below the uterus the cervix opens into the vagina, which runs down to the external genitalia — labelled with the fimbriae at the tube's opening, the urethra opening in front of the vagina, and the clitoris, labium minora and labium majora forming the external vulval structures, …
What this figure shows. A frontal (coronal) schematic of the internal female reproductive organs showing a pair of ovaries each connected by a fallopian tube made up of the fringed fimbriae, the funnel-shaped infundibulum, the wide ampulla and the narrow isthmus leading into the uterus; the uterus is shown with its endometrial lining and narrowing into the cervical canal, which opens into the vagina — laying out, left to right and top to bottom, the full internal passage an ovum and t …