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InkFlaskCambridge IGCSE

Pupil sheet · Blood vessels

Artery or vein? — questions

Name ______________________ Date ____________

Try every question before you use a nudge. Write in full sentences where you are asked to explain.

1. describe

Which statement describes an artery compared with a vein?

Circle one answer.

  • a thicker wall and a narrower lumen
  • a thinner wall and a wider lumen
  • a wall one cell thick and no lumen
  • a thicker wall and a wider lumen

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Think of the artery on your slide: how thick was its wall compared with its lumen?

2. identify

The diagram shows three blood vessels cut across. Match each letter to the vessel it shows.

Three blood vessels cut across, lettered P, Q and R. P: a round vessel with a thick wall of muscle and wavy elastic fibres and a narrow lumen. Q: a larger, slightly flattened vessel with a thin wall and a wide lumen. R: a tiny vessel whose wall is one flattened cell thick, with one red blood cell almost filling it (drawn far larger than its real size).

Write the number of the matching option.

  1. vein
  2. capillary
  3. artery
  • P: ______
  • Q: ______
  • R: ______

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Look at the wall of each: thick with muscle, thin, or one cell thick?

3. complete

Complete the sentences about valves.

Valves are found along the length of … .

They prevent the … of blood.

So the blood can only flow … the heart.

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Valves are found in one kind of vessel only. What do they stop?

4. explain

Supplement. Which statement explains why an artery has a thick wall?

Circle one answer.

  • to withstand the high pressure of the blood
  • to stop the blood flowing back to the heart
  • to stop oxygen leaking out of the blood
  • to make the blood flow more slowly

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Where has the blood in an artery just come from?

5. explain

Supplement. The elastic tissue in an artery's wall stretches as each surge of blood arrives. What does it do between beats, and what is the result?

Nudge (only if you are stuck): An elastic band that is stretched and let go: what does it do?

6. calculate

On a slide at ×100 showing a transverse section of a vessel, a line through its centre crosses its wall on the left over 280 µm and on the right over 320 µm. The lumen between the inner edges is 300 µm. (a) Calculate the wall thickness. (b) Calculate wall ÷ lumen. (c) Is the vessel an artery or a vein?

(a) Wall thickness: ______________ unit ________

(b) Wall ÷ lumen: ______________ unit ________

(c) Artery or vein, and why

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Wall thickness is the mean of the two sides.

7. describe

Describe two differences between the structure of an artery and the structure of a vein.

(a) First difference

(b) Second difference

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Compare the walls, the lumens, and what is inside a vein but not along an artery.

8. explain

Supplement. The graph shows blood pressure along the path of the blood from the heart. Use it to explain why veins have valves but arteries do not.

A graph of blood pressure (kPa, 0 to 18) along the path of the blood from the heart: aorta, arteries, small arteries, capillaries, small veins, veins, vena cava. A shaded band shows the pressure at each beat (top line) and between beats (dashed lower line). In the aorta it swings from 16 kPa at each beat to 10.7 kPa between beats, and in the arteries from 15.5 to 10.5 kPa. In the small arteries it falls to between 12 and 7 kPa, and in the capillaries to about 3 kPa, where it no longer rises and falls with each beat and the band ends. In the veins it is smooth, low and steady: about 1 kPa, falling to about 0.5 kPa in the vena cava. Illustrative values for a resting adult.

Nudge (only if you are stuck): Compare the pressure in the arteries with the pressure in the veins.

9. explain

Supplement. Explain how the structure of a vein is related to the low pressure of the blood it carries. Give two features.

(a) First feature and how it fits

(b) Second feature and how it fits

Nudge (only if you are stuck): What does low-pressure blood not need, and what does it need help with?

10. identify

A student looks at a slide of two vessels side by side and says: "The flattened one is the artery, because the blood pushed it out of shape." Do you agree? Explain how to decide which vessel is the artery.

Nudge (only if you are stuck): What on the slide is good evidence, and what could come from the way the slide was made?

11. suggest

Supplement. The aorta has more elastic tissue in its wall than any other artery. Suggest why.

Nudge (only if you are stuck): The aorta is the first artery the blood enters from the left ventricle.

12. explain

Supplement. A soldier who stands still at attention for a long time on a hot day may faint, because too little blood comes back from the legs to the heart, so too little reaches the brain. Soldiers are taught to tighten and relax their leg muscles now and then while they stand. Explain how this helps the blood in the leg veins return to the heart.

Nudge (only if you are stuck): What happens to the veins between the leg muscles when the muscles contract?