Anatomy study note · Thorax

Lung

The paired organs of respiration, each lying free in its pleural cavity and attached to the mediastinum only by its root at the hilum. The right lung is slightly larger and has three lobes; the left has two.

Key points

• Right: 3 lobes, horizontal + oblique fissures. Left: 2 lobes, oblique fissure, cardiac notch + lingula.
• Horizontal fissure = 4th costal cartilage; oblique = T2 → 6th costal cartilage.
• Root: bronchus, pulmonary artery, 2 pulmonary veins, bronchial vessels, nodes, nerves.
• Bronchial arteries (aorta) nourish; pulmonary arteries exchange gas.
• Lymph → hilar → tracheobronchial nodes.
• Visceral pleura painless; parietal pleura painful.
• Lung bud → bronchial tree → alveoli.
• Surfactant deficiency in prematurity.
• Type I pneumocyte: gas exchange. Type II: surfactant.
• Bronchioles: no cartilage, no glands.

The full note in the atlas also covers

Features · Blood supply · Nerve supply · Lymph drainage · Histology · Development · Clinical notes

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Written from

• Snell’s Clinical Anatomy by Regions, 10th ed., ch. 5, PDF pp. 551–559, 573–599
• Inderbir Singh’s Human Embryology, ch. 14, PDF pp. 196, 209, 213
• BRS Cell Biology & Histology, 7th ed., ch. 15, PDF pp. 271–279

More from the thorax

• Lymph nodes of the thoracic wall
• Main and lobar bronchi
• Mediastinal and tracheobronchial lymph nodes
• Mitral valve
• Pulmonary trunk
• Pulmonary valve
• Pulmonary veins
• Ribs
• Right atrium
• Right coronary artery
• Right ventricle
• Serratus posterior muscles

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