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Is it true that some body systems are 

more familiar? Well-known? For example,  

the circulatory system: many automatically know: 

it includes the heart. Nervous system: yeah,  

the brain and many other things involved with 

it. Digestive system? We all know the overall  

function and many structures of it. Muscular 

system: ok you get the point. We’re adding to  

our body systems video collection, but there’s 

one system that I notice people aren’t quite  

sure about what it includes, nor do they realize 

how incredible it is - It's the excretory system.

In this video, we’re going to 

introduce the human excretory system,  

and then put extra focus on 

the kidneys, and then…the  

nephron. The nephron we save for the end. SO, 

DON’T SKIP THE END OR YOU MISS THE BEST PART!

Ok, so let’s consider two obstacles that 

have to be addressed for survival. I mean,  

there’s a lot of obstacles 

– but here are two big ones.

One - You have to maintain an osmotic balance– 

that means you got to find an osmotic balance  

by managing the water and the solutes in the body. 

And two - You have to get rid of metabolic wastes.  

What’s metabolic waste? Well, it could include 

carbon dioxide. Or nitrogenous wastes – which  

occur from the breakdown of proteins. There’s a 

lot of protein breakdown in metabolic processes  

after all. The excretory system focuses 

on addressing those two major issues.

Many organs and structures have roles in 

addressing these two issues and therefore serve  

roles in the excretory system. The skin- which can 

excrete water and substances. The liver – highly  

involved in detoxification and produces urea- 

more on urea later. The lungs – which excrete  
the gas waste carbon dioxide. And those organs 
are also involved in other systems – remember  

body systems don’t work in isolation- the skin is 

an organ of the integumentary system, the liver is  

an accessory organ in the digestive system, 

lungs are organs of the respiratory system.

But our focus in our short time is going to be 

on another set of organs that play a huge role  

in the excretory system – the kidneys. In fact, 

we could say the urinary system if wanted to  

isolate to these structures: kidneys – there are 

two and found in the lower back. The bladder – a  

single sac that will hold urine. Ureters- there 

are two and these drain the urine produced from  

the kidneys to the bladder. Urethra – a single 

tube where the urine will travel out of the body.

So urine is produced by the kidneys, and 

we’re going to focus on the process that makes  

urine. Blood is filtered by the kidney, 

producing urine, which is a portion of  

the body’s waste products that need to be 

excreted. A reminder, we like to show a  

general and simplified version of very complex 

topics – so explore our description for more!

We start with this beautiful 

thing called…the nephron.  

Each kidney has tons of them. Like one 

kidney can have a million of these things.  

They are the functional unit of the kidney. 

It has a lot of different parts, but  

its overall goal is to process waste 

products from the blood to create urine.

The first part of the nephron that we’ll talk 

about has something called the glomerulus,  

which you could consider a specialized mass 

of capillaries. It is surrounded by this,  

the Bowman’s Capsule. Blood pressure forces fluid 

from the blood in the glomerulus into the Bowman’s  

capsule. Once this fluid is in the Bowman’s 

capsule, the fluid is called the filtrate. What’s  
in filtrate? Well, here are a few major things: 
water. Some glucose and amino acids. Salts.  

H+ ions. Bicarbonate ions (HCO3-). Other ions. 

Some medications- if applicable. Some vitamins.  

And urea. A nitrogenous waste produced by the 

liver that the body needs to get rid of. So the  

nephron is going to take this filtrate through the 

ride of its life while it processes it . Some of  

the filtrate is reabsorbed, meaning some of the 

filtrate will cross the barrier of the nephron  

back into the fluid surrounding the nephron (also 

called the interstitial fluid), and eventually  

circulate again through the body. But in order 

to get rid of some components -and eventually  

excreting them as urine- those items will be in 

the tubes of the nephron eventually to form urine.

Some substances that enter or leave the nephron: 

they might travel by diffusion or facilitated  

diffusion. Remember, diffusion and facilitated 

diffusion don’t require the help of ATP and  

those transport types moves with the gradient 

from high to low concentration. But sometimes,  

substances are transported by 

active transport – requiring  

ATP. We aren’t really focusing on the specific 

type of transport in this video, but that’s a  

fascinating concept to further explore and we do 

want you to know it varies– see video details.

Let’s go! We go from the Bowman’s capsule to 

Proximal Tubule. Proximal can mean “near” and it  

is the tubule nearest the glomerulus. Important, 

because there is another tubule later on.  

In this proximal tubule, NaCl moves to the 

interstitial fluid. A little about NaCl:  

it is a salt. I’m going say NaCl in this video 

a lot but realize that to enter or leave, the  

Na+ and Cl- can separate to go through separate 

channels. Water will follow by osmosis – which  

makes sense, this interstitial fluid is 

hypertonic due to NaCl exiting. Therefore,  

we say salt and water are reabsorbed because 

they’re not staying in the nephron here-  

they’re going to the interstitial fluid. 

Other substances like glucose, amino acids,  

potassium (K+), and bicarbonate (HCO3-) are 

also reabsorbed- again meaning, they’re going  

to the interstitial fluid by either active or 

passive transport. Now when we say reabsorbed,  

not all of these are 100% reabsorbed, and so some 

concentrations of these remain in the filtrate.  

Now what is secreted? Meaning what will 

move from outside the tubule (the fluid  

surrounding this area of the nephron) into 

the proximal tubule? H+ ions and ammonium  

ions (NH4+) are some items secreted. With the 

substances being reabsorbed and secreted – like  

bicarbonate and H+– you can tell the proximal 

tubule is important for pH regulation.

Now we move into the loop of Henle. It has a 

descending limb – going down – and an ascending  

limb – going up! We start with the descending 

limb – going down. There’s a lot of aquaporins  

here. Remember those channels? Aquaporins make it 

easy for water to travel through. So the water can  

get reabsorbed here because the water can get out 

of the loop and into the interstitial fluid. And  

by osmosis, water would travel that way as the 

interstitial fluid is hypertonic at this part.  

That means the interstitial fluid has 

a higher solute concentration than the  

filtrate - and remember that water generally 

has a net movement towards hypertonic areas.

Now, the descending LIMB of Henle doesn’t have 

channels for most solutes – like salt – and so  

NaCl is stuck in the nephron. So as you 

descend down and water continues to exit,  

the solute concentration INSIDE the filtrate 

of this descending LIMB continues to increase.
Time to go up the ascending LIMB of Henle. Now 
there aren’t aquaporins here meaning the water in  

the filtrate can’t get out. But there are proteins 

that the NaCl can now travel through to leave and  

get reabsorbed. So in the thin segment of this 

ascending limb, NaCl will diffuse out. It makes  

sense that it would – the NaCl is moving from a 

high concentration of NaCl [in the filtrate] to  

a lower concentration of NaCl [in the interstitial 

fluid]. Now in the thick segment of the ascending  

limb, NaCl continues to exit the nephron but this 

time it’s pumped out by active transport. So if  

you’re losing all this salt, you can imagine it 

is making the filtrate very dilute at this point.

Okay, now on to the distal convoluted tubule. In 

this area, you’ll see H+, ammonium, potassium,  

and more substances secreted – which means into 

the filtrate it goes. Whereas substances like  

NaCl, water, and bicarbonate will be reabsorbed, 

meaning they’re exiting the filtrate to be  

reabsorbed into the interstitial fluid. This 

distal tubule also contributes to pH regulation.

And now, it is time, for the collecting duct. 

It is time for the filtrate to become urine.  

NaCl will be able to be reabsorbed. Water, 

too, but hormonal control really regulates  

the amount of water here. The permeability to 

water of this collecting duct is controlled by  

hormones. After all, a person who is dehydrated 

needs to have as much water as possible  

to be reabsorbed into the interstitial 

fluid. The filtrate, on the other hand,  

will be very concentrated. A person who has 

had a lot of water to drink may have less  

water reabsorbed into the interstitial fluid – and 

thus that person’s urine may be much more dilute.  

Now we mentioned what urea was and that 

throughout this nephron there would be  

times it was reabsorbed and secreted. In the 

collecting duct, there is now a significant  
amount of urea in this filtrate, but since 
there is high concentration, I do want to  

mention that some urea will be reabsorbed by 

diffusion into the interstitial fluid, too.

Urine that is produced by 

the nephrons of the kidneys  

will ultimately travel down the two 

ureters. Then the urine will be stored  

in the bladder before it is expelled 

from the body through the urethra.

Now, again, there are far more substances 

moving in and out of the nephron than we  

focused on. But the overall goal is that you 

can see the complexity of this. It’s not just  

that kidneys are filtering out stuff from the 

blood – no, the nephrons of the kidneys control  

the reabsorption of many substances and then 

the secretion of many substances and all of  

this is influenced by hormonal control and the 

osmotic balance that surrounds these structures!  

So intricate. In fact, there are medications 

used to treat certain conditions that act on  

these osmotic values. For example, diuretics. 

Diuretics are prescribed for high blood pressure,  

congestive heart failure, and other conditions. 

While there are different types of diuretics,  

one major concept is they tend to increase the 

amount of water in the filtrate of the nephron so  

more water is typically present in the urine.

What about a situation where a person has 

severely compromised kidney function? If a  

kidney transplant is not ideal 

or possible for the situation,  

the person may need regular dialysis. 

Hemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis  

are options that involve filtering the 

blood and assisting with osmoregulation.

If learning about the kidneys makes you 

want to explore more, just to emphasize:  
there are careers focused on kidney function 
alone. A nephrologist for example. Well,  

that’s it for the Amoeba Sisters, 

and we remind you to stay curious.