Vascular Arrangement of the Rat Renal Glomerulus. A Scanning Electron Microscope Study of Corrosion Casts

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Abstract
Corrosion casts of the vascular beds of the rat kidney were prepared with methacrylic methyl ester resin, and sixty casts of normal glomeruli with single efferent arterioles were isolated. The isolated casts were microdissected in a warmed alcohol bath and observed under the scanning electron microscope. The same glomerular cast was observed from different directions and at different stages of microdissection, so that the distribution and connections of the vessels could be fully elucidated.1. The glomerulus consists of capillary networks, which are intercalated between the afferent and efferent arterioles and organized into fairly independent functional and anatomical units, the glomerular capillary lobules.2. The glomerular capillary lobules intercommunicate with each other by a few translobular vessels, but occasionally there occur lobules with no communication with other lobules.3. Short or direct communicating circuits between the afferent and efferent arterioles were never encountered. All vessels derived from the afferent arteriole break up into fine capillaries forming the glomerular lobules, the units of true anastomosing networks of the glomerular capillaries. In the lobule there was recognized no marginal capillary forming a main route from the afferent to efferent arterioles.

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