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What shape is a red blood cell?Human red blood cells have strange shape. They are a bit like what you would get if you took a ball of clay and pushed your fingers into the side -- like a doughnut with no hole. This shape is called discotic because it is similar to a disc (flat and round). Take a look at the 3D model below:
If the movement is too slow on your computer then click on the `coarser' button. This will produce a simpler model (less smooth) which should work faster. If you want to make the shape smoother, but slower, click on the `finer' button. You can see that the shape is symmetric: the two sides are the same with concave (*)middle sections. How big is a red blood cell?Human red blood cells are about 8 µm in diameter. That is, they are 8 micro-meters (symbol µm); 8 millionths of a meter; or 8 thousandths of a millimeter across. In other words, if you could pick the cells up and lay them down flat in a line, placing 1250 of them in a row would make a line 1 cm long.
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