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The structure of the penis

The penis consists of two sections - the penis head or glans penis, the penile shaft. Hovever, the penis continues in a hidden structure laying under the scotum and reaching further backward in the perineal area towards the prostate. When the penis is erect, also the perineum, the area between the legs will be swollen.

The urinary tube (urethra) goes from the bladder, then through the prostate, then enters this penile structure just beneath the prostate and then goes foreward all the way to the tip of the penis.


The erectile bodies

It the penis and in the structure extending backwards there are three bodies that swell during erection, erectile bodies. The bodies are mostly made of a thight mesh of fine blood vessels with very elastic walls. There are two bodies along the upper part of the penis ( corpora cavernosa) that extend backwards under the scrotum. Than there is one body around the urethra (corpus spongiosum) that continues backwards to just under the prostate.

The arteries leading blood to the erectile bodies and the veins leading blood from these bodies, have muscles in their walls that can close off or relaxe to regulate the blood flow to and from these bodies.

When the muscles at the entrance relaxe and those at the opening constrict, blood is filled into the mesh by the blood pressure. The mesh will then engorge as a baloon and get staright. The swelling and straightening of the erctile bodies will inflate the whole penis and make it erect. This activity is regulated by nerve impulses and the substance nitrogen oxide working as a local tissue hormone.

Each erectile body is confined by a robust and elastic sheet of connective tissue. Also in the penile circumpherence around all the erectile bodies and all the inner structures of the penis, there is a robust sheet of elastic connective tissue, the fibrous enbvelope.

In the perineal region on both sides between this sheet and the outer skin there are a muscle sheet called the bulbospongiosus msucle. This muscle contracts during ejaculation and helps to push out the semen.

The penis are made from the basic structural components as the clirtoris and certain vulvar parts of the women. The clitoris has erectile bodies like the penis, and these bodies continue into the inner structure of the culva in the same way as the erectile bodies of a man continue backwaqrds towards the anal and prostate region.


The skin and outer structures of the penis

The penile skin is thick and robust. Between the skin and the fibrous envelope, there is a thin area consisting of a soft and extremely elastic connective tissue. Therefore the skin can easily be moved up and down along the penile shaft.

The penis head is covered by a thin widh is extremely sensitive by means of a rich innervation. Still this thin skin is both strong and elestic. In addition the skin in an uncircumcized penis is covered by a hood that is not stock to the surface of the head after early infancy, the foreskin.

The foreskin is a continuation of the skin covering the shaft that goes to the tip of the penis and is then Ifolded back inwards, making a double layer, where the inner fold is fastened just under the penis head. Between the two folds there are an extreemely soft and elastic tissue.

At the under-side of the penis just under the lower corner of the urethra in the border area between the penile head and penile shaft there is a band that goes from there into the inner side of the foreskin - the frenulum. The frenulum hinders the foreskin from being retracted to long down te penile shaft during erections and helps to pull the foreskin back over the penile head again when an erection ceases. The frenulum is also a very sensual area, and since the frenulum allways will be stretched during sexual activities it gives rize to much good sensations.

The foreskin can easily be retracted to show the bare penis head, and it uses to retract itself when the penis is erect. When the penis is not erected, the foreskin protects the penis head.

In early infancy the foreskin is fixed to the penis head, but will gradually loosen, usually during early infancy, but in a preteen boy there can still be some adhesions left around the base of the head.

In a young boy the foreskin is usually much longer than the penis head, ad will often end in a long tap in front of the penile head. As the boy developes into a mature man, the rest of the penis grows usually more than the foreskin, and the forskin will then usually just cover the urethral opening in the unerect penis or even let the urethral opening remain permanently exposed. In some men the rest of the penis grows even so much in comparizon to the foreskin that the foreskin remains permanently withdrawn.

In some cultures it is custom to remove the foreskin for various reasons by an opeartion called circumcission., making the penis head permanently exposed and visible. When circumcission is done in early infancy, the procedure also involves tearing the fixed foreskin loose from the surface of the head.

The skin of the penis head and the inner surface of the foreskin make a whittish fatty substance called smegma. The smegma helps to lubricate the penis during intercource. The smegma is composed of oily substances excreted by the skin, loosened skin cells full of fat and secretes from the sebaceous glands of the foreskin. There is normally also some bacterial growth in the smegma and the bacteria make substances giving the smegma a characteristic smell. By improper hygiene too much smegma with too much bacterial growth can accumulate.


The nerve and blood supply of the penis

The main nerves controlling the penile function and bringing sensual stilmuli from the penis are the dorsal penile nerves, situated on both sides in the connective tissue of the upper side of the penis and branching out to all parts of the penis. Erection is controlled by sensual stimuli going to the spinal cord and controle impulses comming back, both through this nerve.

The ejaculation is controlled by other nerves. The nerve cells controlling erection and ejaculation belongs to the sympathetic nerve system, a part of the nerve system not in direct volontary controle.

The main blood supply of the penis comes from the dorsal penile arteries going in the connective tissue at the upper side of the penis and branching off to all parts of the penile skin and inner penile structures.


The urethra

The urinary tube or urethra enters the penile structure just beneath the prostate and goes through the bulbospongiosus erectile body to the tip of the penis. The urethra consists of an innermost epithelial layer, a leyer of connective tissue in the middle, and a surrounding muscular wall.

The urethra is about 8 inches (17.5 cm) long. The inside of the urethra has a spiral groove, like gun barrel rifles, which make the urine flow in a wide stream. Just before the tip of the penis the urethra is widened out to a bulbous shape.

Before going into the penile structure it passes through the prostate and through the urethral spincter, a muscular structure that closes the urethra for urine passage between each voiding. At this place there are also two small glands, the bulbourethral glands or Cowpers glands, that produce a lubricating fluid that also protects the urethra from the corrosive substances in the urine.

Inside the prostate another duct, the ejaculatory duct, goes into the urethra on both sides.

The ejaculatory duct passes semen into the urethra from the seminal vescicles by each ejaculation. The vas deferens or spermatic cord, the duct that is coming from each testicles joins the ejaculatory duct inside the prostate after the outlet of the seminal vescicle on each side. In the time between each ejaculation, secrets from the prostate and the material from the testicles conducted into the ejaculatoruy duct are passed the other way into the seminal vescicles and blended and stored there. The material from the testicles contain the sperm cells, or spermatocytes.

The semen is pumped through the urethra out of the penis by muscular actions around and in the urethra and in the seminal vecicles.

The urethra going through the penile structure has a lot of small glands around it and small ducts from these glands upening into the urethra, the uretral glands or glands of Littre. These make a lubricating slime that also is protecting the urethra from corrosive urine.


The sensational resceptors of the penis

In the skin of glans penis there are sensorial nerve endings in all layers. In the epidermis, the outernmoust part, there are free nerve endings that can recogize changes in the skin.

In the underlaying dermis feeling bodies constisting of nerve endings surrounded by capsules made of fibres and connective tissue cells can be found, of which there are many sorts. There are genital end bulbs that can recogize pressure of the kind occuring towards the penis during sexual activities. These are structures consisting of a baloon-like sack made of connective tissue cells, a content of a viscious fluid and the nerve ending in the middle.

There are pacinian corpusles consisting of the nerve ending surrounded by many layers of connective tissue cells, capable of recogizing harder pressure.

Some ruffini corpuscles yhere are also. These are oblongs structures consisting of many layers of connective tissue cells and a branched nerve ending inside. They are sensitive to vibration.

In the whole glans free nerve endings can be found, either myelinated or without myelin. Myelin are special cells wrapped around the nerve fibre and this wrapping consists mainly of phospholipids and proteins. They have an insulating function or otherwise support the function of the nerve. Also in the deeper layer of the glans one can find genital end bulbs.

The sensations in the penis are intimately connected to the erections. When the penis is stimulated, the sensory bodies and nerve endings recognize the stimulations and signals are sent to the spinal cord and up to the brain. Celles in the spinal cord and brain will now increase their activities and send signals back to the penis and the rest of the genital zone. These signals will make the entrances to blood vessels in the erectile bodies open so that blood streams in and the penis gets engorged and erect. The engorgement increases the pressure in th penile tissues. The pressure itself will stimulate many more sensory bodies and nerve endings to send impulses up to the brain. The pressure also makes the sensationl bodies and nerves more sensitive so that less stimulation is needed to make them send impulses to the brain. This way stimulation of the penis stimulates erection to occur and the erection makes the stimulation to work even stronger, and this stimulates to even stronger erection and even stronger sensations.


Variations of the penis

Penises differs great in size, both in flaccid condition and when erect. There is however a tendency for small flaccid penises to engorge more percentually during erections so that the variations are still not that great when erect.

The size and mass of the penis consist partially of blood contained inside the dense network of blood vessels and of penile tissue. Some penises have more blood inside also when flaccid than others, and that account fro some of the variations in flaccid size.

Some penises have also greater potency to be filled with blood than others, perhaps due to a tighter blood vessel network and a more elastic network, which also accounts for some of the variations in the erect state.

The penis grows in length and girth from early in life to the end of puberty and this growth is especially strong during te puberty process. After puberty it tends to grow further in girth until the man gets old, but very little in length.

As a small infant, the boy often have a great penis in proportion to the total body size. Until puberty the body grows proportionally more than the penis, but during puberty the penis usually grows more than the rest of the body proportionally.

The proportion of skin, and especially foreskin to the rest of the penis is greatly variable. Som penises have that much foreskin, that it constitutes an extention before the tip of the penile head when it is flaccid. Young boys tend to have a greater proportion of foreskin than mature men and this phenomenon is therefore mostly seen in young boys.

In some men the foreskin will not retract completely when the penis rise, due to the amount of foreskin and due to the tightness of the frenulum. Usually this do not pose any difficulties by sexual activities, and such a structure actually makes it more easy to masturbate.

Some men have narrower end of the foreskin than others. Often will men with narrow foreskin tip also have very elastic foreskin, so that the narrowness do not pose any difficulty for the retraction of the foreskin. In other men the tight foreskin is less elastic or so thight than it cannot be pulled back, at least without difficulty. This condition is called phimosis. Small boys often have narrow and unretractable foreskin, but it will usually grow large enough to be retracted before te age of 10.

A penis is seldome totally summetrically built. Usually one side of the penis is a little more amply developped than the other side. This causes most penises to incline to the opposite side when flaccid and hanging down. It also causes the penis to stand a little queerely and a little twisted when erect.

The urinary opening can vary in size and shape. It usually has the shape of a slit that opens and get round or ovale during urination and ejaculation. The slit can be short or it can be very long so that it looks like the penile head has two lips. The variations are usually caused by a verying size of a skin fold at each end of the slit that to some extend shuts the inner room in the penile head from the space outside. The room in the end part of the urethra is usaully fairly voluminious.


Anatomy of the penis and male genitals depicted

This picture depicts the anatomy of the penis and the other male sexual organs and shows how the erectile components proceed far backwards towards under the prostate. 4 - corpora cavernosa (grey), 5 - corpus spongiosum (brown-orange), 12 - prostate, 11 - ejaculatory duct, 10 -seminal vescicle.  (A free to use picture from wikipedia.org)