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Asked by isthecatdead to Derek, Elaine, Heather, Keith on 21 Jun 2013.
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Keith Siew answered on 21 Jun 2013:
Well nobody made Kidneys… they evolved to meet the requirement to maintain a stable internal environment and respond to the external environment. So if anything “made” them… it would be the environment!
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Heather Eyre answered on 23 Jun 2013:
Kidneys didn’t just happen, they weren’t just made.
They gradually changed over thousands of years to be as efficient as they are now. This development of kidneys started in freshwater fish, where they were more important in getting rid of the excess water.
As the environment changed the needs of osmoregulation (that’s keeping the right amount of water,and ions, in the blood and body) changed and the kidney changed too. Variety — > Selection by environment —– > breeding and passing on of genes. Evolution.
The excess capacity of the kidney is something that has always amazed me – you can live a perfectly normal life with just one kidney!
We couldn’t make an artificial kidney good enough; dialysis machines ,which do the job of kidneys in people waiting for transplants, are the size of a whole person!
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