Home to connective tissues!
Dense Irregular Connective Tissue
Think of all the locales in your body where tissues are anchored or attached. Skin on the palm of your hand and the sole of your foot is firmly attached to underlying muscle. This muscle is then anchored to underlying bone. In addition, these bones also connect via capsules to form synovial joints capable of movement.
Now, consider the forces generated in digestive organs as these fill and mix food with enzymes. Strong interconnectivity and support between tissues in the walls of these organs is essential to prevent separations of the epithelial linings and underlying muscle layers as the organs perform their functions.
Finally, think of the forces placed across heart valves as these open and snap shut 60-80 times per minute. As your heart rate and blood pressure are continually adjusted during the course of a day, tissues providing support and connectivity for the valves are subjected to highly variable forces.
In these and many more body locales, forces are transmitted across tissues in a non-linear manner. The connective tissues used for interconnection in these sites not only require strength but also resistance to these multiple, non-directional forces. Your body creates a connectivity solution by using collagen, the strongest of the protein fibers arranged randomly to provide resistance to these forces. Densely packed collagen fibers in random arrays indicate dense, irregular connective tissues!
Dense irregular connective tissue is important:
in the dermis and hypodermis(thick skin)
in walls of organs forming the submucosa layer
in periosteum, perichondreum, perineurium(special stain), and perimysium
in the articular capsules of synovial joints
The most typical view of dense irregular connective tissue!
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