This viral image of flower-shaped "breasts" is wildly inaccurate – here's why



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This viral image of

The illustration that has become viral.

Credit: Anatomy and Physiology / El Monfi Nezha

If you thought that viral image claiming to show the flower shaped milk ducts of a woman looked weird, you would be right. This is because the image is not an accurate representation of a woman's mammary glands.

In reality, women's milk ducts look nothing like this picture. And the petal-shaped structures that look like a sophisticated, open umbrella are not milk ducts (we'll explain what they're really in a moment).

More importantly, in real life, the "petals" would not be arranged in this way. [Wonder Woman: 10 Interesting Facts About the Female Body]

The image itself became viral this week, when the Twitter user has @lemonadead the posted April 21, writing: "I just realized that I've never seen a photo of a female muscular system, that's NOT what I thought I looked like."

To date (April 26), the tweet has garnered nearly 140,000 "I like" and a range of incredulous responses. A woman posted"At first I thought someone was putting flowers on the breasts because it was art." Now, this looks like a strange alien creature that lives inside of them. my body and I'm terrified. " And another said "Maybe it just scares people because it's not standardized because of patriarchy that shows us the biology of a man in class."

However, the picture is not a photo as @lemonadead thought, but rather an illustration of an iPad app called Anatomy & Physiology. In addition, the photo does not show the "female muscular system" as suggested by the tweet.

First, a woman's breasts do not contain skeletal muscle, which is usually attached to the bones, according to ScienceAlert. The lobules and ducts in a woman's breasts consist of various types of epithelial cells, according to the 2018 book "Physiology, Lactation". According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, however, there are circular muscles in the areola, the dark area surrounding the nipple, which provide nipple stability when it is stimulated, for example when a baby suckle his milk. The chest also contains smooth muscles, which help the milk to drain as needed; these muscles do not seem to be shown in this particular illustration.

Instead, the illustration clearly highlights the petal-shaped structures. In the iPad application, we speak of "the mammary gland", which is a little misleading because, as ScienceAlert notes, the mammary gland is the entire breast, not just these red buttons.

So, what are the flower arrangements? They are mostly lobules. Each lobule is connected to small ducts called milk ducts (or milk ducts) that, in turn, connect to the nipple, where milk flows when a woman is breastfeeding her child.

Each lobule (that is, each "petal") is made up of cavities – hollow cavities lined with milk-secreting cells. The cells produce milk when they receive some hormonal signal from the body, reported ScienceAlert.

But these lobules are not exactly arranged in a beautiful pattern of flowers; Here is another more realistic illustration.

Here is a more accurate diagram of a woman's mammary gland.

Here is a more accurate diagram of a woman's mammary gland.

Credit: Shutterstock

In addition, these lobules change in number and size, and both increase as a woman's pregnancy progresses, according to "Physiology, Lactation."

Originally published on Science live.

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