Femur

The femur is a bone that makes up the length of the thigh.

Femur is the heaviest, longest and strongest bone in the human body.

It is categorized as a long bone which consists of diaphysis, the shaft and two epiphysis that move with the adjacent bones in hip and knees.

Generally, the length of femur is 26% of the man’s height. This ratio helps anthropologists make a close estimate of a person’s height when examining an incomplete skeleton.

Femurs or femora in plural form, these proximal thigh bones of the legs enable tetrapod vertebrates such as most mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians to walk, jump and run.

In four-legged vertebrates like horses and dogs, femur is found in their rear legs. The head of the femur move with the acetabulum in their pelvic bone to form the hip joint. The distal part move with the tibia and patella to form the knee joint.

In humans, these two thigh bones converge medially to the knees functioning with the proximal ends of the tibiae. In most of the people, the angle of convergence or the femoral-tibial angle is estimated 175 degrees. Females’ femora converge more compared to males’. It is because females have wider pelvic bones than males.

The knock knee condition where femora converge so much and where knees are touching one another is called genu valgum.

The bow-leggedness or opposite extreme of genu valgum is called genu varum.