IMS I Anatomy Lab 2025-26

You will see that we discuss the anatomy of the sexual organs in a binary manner, following a definition of ‘anatomical sex’ (the physical structure including chromosomes, genes and their products) as the most frequent anatomical variants, male and female. We are aware that there are anatomical variants that do not correspond to either the male or female anatomical variants of sex.

With this nomenclature we explicitly acknowledge the differentiation between the terms sex and gender. The latter is a psychological, social and cultural construct, including self-identification; this is independent of physical structure, chromosomes, or genes.

Some Ideas for Lab Prep

1. Skim the lab guide to get an overall sense of where the dissection is going.

2. Study the lab guide more carefully. Click on the bold terms to learn more about them in the Glossary (you are not responsible for the details in the glossary for exams, but you are responsible for being able to identify items in the Structures Revealed lists). 

3. Look up the some of the bold terms in one or more of the following (particularly if you don’t have a good sense of what the structure looks like and where it is located from the lab guide alone):

   1. Visible Body Atlas (or other 3D) app

   2. 2D Anatomical atlas (Netter, Rowan, etc.)

   3. Wikipedia

4. Review the list of structures revealed at the end of the lab guide. Are any of them entirely unfamiliar to you? If so, go back to steps 2 and 3.

5. Watch the dissection video, if there is a video for the specific lab.

6. Take the practice quiz on Canvas to self-assess your preparation. All quizzes are open book.

Commonly used abbreviations:

a. = artery, aa. = arteries

v. = vein, vv. = veins

n. = nerve, nn. = nerves