explain the breakdown of erythrocytes in the body

erythrocytes / red blood cells are broken down in the liver. They enter the liver through the hepatic artery and are engulfed (phagocytosis) by Kupffer cells on the inner wall of sinusoids in the liver. Kupffer cells are specialised cells that breakdown red blood cells. The erythrocytes are first broken into the heme group and the globin group. The Iron is removed from the heme and sent to the bone marrow to produce more haemoglobin for new red blood cells. the rest of the heme group is converted to biliruben which is a bile pigment. The globin group is broken down into its amino acid chains and may undergo different processes depending on what the body needs. eg: deamination where the amine group is removed from an amino acids and is excreted as a component of urine. The components of red blood cells are recycled by the liver.