hi everybody and welcome back to miss Angler's biology class I am Miss angler in today's video we're going to be looking at the male reproductive system we're going to look at the structures their functions and we're also going to overlap this particular lesson with what we've done in spermatogenesis I've linked that video above now so you can watch it perhaps afterwards in preparation for a test where you may need to know both the structure function and processes that occur within the male reproductive system now if you are new here don't forget to give this video a thumbs up and make sure you're subscribed with your notifications turned on because I post every Tuesday and Thursday and if you are in metric looking to improve your marks then you should think about getting my study guide it's filled with tips tricks that I tell my students how to get full marks and I also put a lot of valuable input in there as being a metric marker myself I know exactly how you need to answer the questions in in order to get full marks in your finals as well as just your school exams you can find that on my website which is missangler.co.za and the shop tab now the email reproductive system is also known as the urogenital system and basically what that means is the male reproductive system shares the same space as the urinary system does they both share the urethra um one for urination and the other for ejaculation and that overlap means that we use the same place whereas in females it is different it's two separate places so it's just important to keep that in mind and we can see that in the diagram here because we have the bladder and the bladder is connected directly to the penis via the urethra which would be a tube that now moves down the center of the penis now along with that you also have the testes which are the reproductive organs and they are also attached to the penis as well and so they sort of share their pathway and their Transport Group and what we're going to do is look at how do they manage that specifically how do we manage that for reproduction because sperm production as we've learned in spermatogenesis is very sensitive to pH and temperature and urine is unfortunately acidic which kills our sperm cells so the first aspect of the male reproductive system that we are going to look at is the testes and the seminiferous tubules and there's some really key important pieces that we need to focus in here and there's one that I'm going to highlight now that you need to really pay attention and also take this definition out of your exam guideline because that is ultimately like our life sciences Bible when it comes to certain definitions is what does the guideline say so first of all we're going to start off by looking at the external protective layer that sits outside of the testes which is known as the scrotum and it protects the testes it's filled with nerve endings and it actually also has the ability to pull the test is close to the body or further away depending on the temperature outside of the body and that is because sperm is sensitive to temperature and it needs to be made at about two degrees lower than internal body temperature the next thing I want to bring your attention to is the actual testus or testy itself which is the structure over here and that of course is the site of sperm production or spermatogenesis it is also where testosterone is produced now to see that even further what we've done on the picture on the right hand side is we've done a cross section through the actual testy so that we can see what it looks like on the inside and you'll notice these small thin tubes running through here and those are referred to as seminiferous tubules and that is where sperm cells are actually made so they're made inside those teeny tiny little tubes under the influence of testosterone and they form sperm cells now it is at this point that I would like you to make a sort of note to yourself that you need to have the exam guideline definition of spermatogenesis it's really important that you know where happens in the seminiferous tubules you need to know under the influence of testosterone and you need to know that you are taking diploid cells and making them into haploid sperm cells that's really important to make a note of that now the next thing that I want to point out in that cross section is you will notice all the tubes collect in an area at the top over here and that area up at the top is referred to as our epididymis and the epididymis is the site of sperm maturation and basically what that means is when you're making a sperm cell it is often just the actual head of the sperm that you have created what you still need to do is you need to grow a neck piece you need to grow a tail it needs to get bigger more mature and stable and it needs to go somewhere to do that and it goes and does that in the epididymis and it waits for possible ejaculation I also want to clarify that whilst it's in the epididymis there is no seminal fluid present in other words there is no semen or liquid that is present at this point the seminal fluids are added later on and we're going to get to when and where they come from as well as their functions now if the sperm cells are going to be used they need to now leave the testes and they are going to leave the the testes through this tube over here called the vast difference I'm actually going to draw that a little bit clearer so we point right to it this here in some textbooks they call it the sperm duct it also is called the vas deferens and it is a smooth muscular tube that contracts with peristalsic waves and it pushes the sperm cells from the epididymis all the way around and all the way up and then out and so it squeezes them out during ejaculation now let's zoom out a little bit and have a look at the rest of the structures of the male reproductive system and what you'll notice is we've already covered the testes the epididymis and the vas deferens and so now what I want to look at is the remaining structures particularly the glands now some of these glands actually come in twos but you can't see them in this side view I'm going to just point out which of those are actually Pairs and that you just can see the one and not the other in this diagram now the first thing that we're going to focus in on is the prostate gland which is this structure over here sitting just below the bladder and it sits around the top end of the urethra and it has really important function of producing secretions used in semen and that secretion is filled with nutrients for sperm cells because remember sperm cells have a really long journey to travel they need to go all the way across the uterus to the Fallopian tubes it's a long distance they need a lot of energy for the market mitochondria that are in their neck piece and the energy they require is glucose and so that is going to come in the form of nutrients from the prostate gland now the next gland I want to highlight for you is the seminal vesicle there are two of these you can only see one of them in this picture and it sits just behind the bladder over here and its main responsibility again is to produce secretions for semen and that secretion neutralizes the pH of the vagina the vagina is acidic for reasons like protection against pathogens and diseases and in order to make the inside of the vagina more hospitable to suit to sperm cells what we want to do is we want to neutralize that acidic environment and make it more of a comfortable place for sperm cells to live so that they can fertilize the egg or the ovum now the next gland I refer to it as the Calpers gland so I'm just going to scratch out this name over here and you can too also call it the carpis gland it's an acceptable name now the Cowper's Gland you also have two of these and the Copper's glands function is also associated with producing a secretion for semen but the fluid assists in the movement of sperm and sperm needs to be able to swim and what's really interesting by the way if you don't know this the way in which sperms swim is you think their tails go side to side like this but in actual fact they spiral when they swim so that movement in of itself is quite challenging and so they need a really great environment to swim in and so the Cowper's gland produces this thicker alkaline mucus that they can swim through and that they can locomote and have good motility in now the last little bit that I want to point out to you here is the urethra and the penis now I'm just going to move the copper gland definition up just an over out of the way and I'm just going to put here what the urethra is in its function which is the tube that sperm move through now it is also what urine passes through so along with neutralizing the pH of the vagina the seminal vesicle also neutralizes the inside of the urethra and finally we're going to move through the penis itself so I'm just going to highlight the urethra which starts up here let's actually do it in like a gray color so that we can see there's the urethra going all the way down and out and one of the most common questions I get by the way from my students is where does the vas deferens start and the urethra end type of thing like because there are continuations of one another so when does when does each one like begin and each one end and so A good rule of thumb is the urethra starts inside of the bladder over here and it moves down into the penis there coming from the right hand side over here is the vast difference okay and so if I travel the whole way for the vast difference let's put it in a different color so we can actually see it's put in red the vast difference is going to go from the epididymis all the way around the bladder through and pass the seminal vesicles through and past the prostate gland and so where they join where they meet where that black and red line meet together the vast difference ends there and now becomes the urethra now when it comes to the penis we actually don't really need to know any of these names of the tissues on the inside of the penis just to know that it's called erectile tissue it fills with blood it's like a spongy tissue and the purpose of the penis is to deliver semen to the vagina in order for fertilization to occur but that's really all we need to know on this diagram now as always I like to finish off my lessons with the terminology recap so let's run through some of these words and you can use these as words on your flashcards when you are studying for your tests and exams now we looked at the testes which are the glands responsible for producing testosterone and sperm cells those sperm cells are made in the seminiferous tubules and then we store those sperm cells in the epididymis the epididymis then links into the tube called the vas deferens which is a muscular tube that connects the testes to the urethra and that's the pathway that sperm cells will swim from the testes to the penis then we spoke about the various glands and those secretions we had the prostate gland and its secretion is full of nutrients for the sperm we have the seminal vesicle which neutralizes the pH of the vagina with its secretion and finally the Copper's gland which also has an important function in creating a secretion that improves the motility or or the mobility of the sperm cells on their way to their destination we also spoke about the penis which is filled with erectile tissue and we spoke about its function for reproduction which is to deliver sperm cells to the ovum during fertilization and last but not least the urethra which remember has two functions one for urination and one for reproduction but in this case the urethra is responsible for transporting semen and just a little extra note here about semen again don't forget semen is made up of sperm and secretions added together now if you like this video don't forget to give it a thumbs up and make sure you're subscribed with your notifications turned on because I post every Tuesday and Thursday and I'll see you all again soon bye