Histology Mnemonics

Histology Mnemonics: Your Path to Tissue Knowledge

T

Taste buds: vallate vs. fungiform distribution

• Cross sectional shape of the top of the bud tells their distribution.
• Vallate: has a shallow ‘V‘ at the top, so has a ‘V‘ distribution at the back of the tongue.
• Fungiform: top is round so it is towards the round end of the tongue.
  • Note vallate is also sometimes called circumvallate.
    • Author: Robert O’Connor University College Dublin

L

Leukocytes: granulated and agranulated: “BEN Loves Money”:

Granulocytes:

• Basophil
• Eosinophil
• Neurophil

Agranulocytes:

• Lymphocytes
• Monocytes
• ­ Alternatively: Granpa BEN…” to keep the granulated group straight.
  • Author: Priya and Abe UNIBE

M

1. Mast cell primary granule contents“Master, His Hepes Causes Choking & Gagging!”:

• Mast = Mast cell
• His = Histamine
• He= Heparin
• C = Chymase
• Ch = Chemotactic factor for eosinophils
• Gag = GAGase
  • Author: Ms Sushi UCLA Medicine

Muscle cells: cardiac vs. skeletal’s nuclei location/number

• Nuclei location mirrors where the muscle is located in human body.
• Heart muscle is in the middle of body, so heart muscle has nucleus in middle.
• Skeletal muscles are at periphery of body, so nuclei are at periphery.
• Also, you have 1 heart, so usually only 1 nucleus per heart muscle cell, but have many skeletal muscles,
• so have many nuclei per long fibre.
  • Author: Robert O’Connor University College Dublin

Muscle sarcomere: A vs. I as light or dark

• There is only one vowel in “dark” and one vowel in “light”.
• These one vowels match up to their one letter names:
• DArk band is the A
• LIght band is the I
  • Author: Robert O’Connor University College Dublin

Muscle sarcomere: H line vs. Z disc location

• HAZI (Hazy):
• H line is in A-band.
• Z disc is in the I
  • Author: Sujay Patel University College Dublin

N

Neutrophil’s 2 distinctive physical features

1: There’s up to 5 lobes of the nucleus joined by thin appendages. Tie this to it being a
neutrophil nucleus by arranging the 5 lobes into a capital N for Neutrophil.

2: the chicken leg (Barr Body) sticking out. Say it out loud: chick-N. The chick-N leg is for
Neutrophil.

• • Author: Robert O’Connor University College Dublin

V

Vascular endothelium: simplified cross-section: LIMA:

• Lumen
• Intima
• Media
• Adventitia
  • Reference: http://medicalmnemonics.com/