afférents

Afférents is a term used in medicine and biology to describe structures or pathways that convey information toward a central point, typically toward the brain or a lymphoid organ. The counterpart term is efférents, describing pathways that carry information away from the center. The root is Latin afferre, meaning to bring toward, and the French form afférent.

In neuroanatomy, afferent fibers carry sensory information from peripheral receptors to the central nervous system. Examples include somatosensory afferents from the skin and proprioceptive afferents from muscles, as well as visceral afferents that relay information from internal organs. These signals often pass through dorsal root ganglia and first synapse in the spinal cord or brainstem before reaching higher brain centers.

In the lymphatic system, afferent vessels transport lymph toward lymph nodes, where it may be filtered and processed. This contrasts with efferent lymphatic vessels that drain lymph away from the node into downstream vessels and the bloodstream.

The term also appears in other physiological contexts, such as afferent pathways of reflexes (for example the afferent limb of the pupillary light reflex) and in broader descriptions of information flow within organs. Afférents is commonly used in French medical literature and is sometimes encountered in English-language texts adopting French terminology.