The human body is very complicated and fascinating You could even say it is one of the most amazing living forms on Earth. To convince yourself of the uniqueness of your body, you can continue reading and get to know five facts about the human body you probably don’t know yet.
Fact 1: Your ears get bigger every day Even though, on average, ears stop growing around the age of ten, they do change shape and can thus appear larger. The reason for that is gravity! Our ears are made of cartilage. Collagen and other fibers, which make up cartilage, start to deteriorate as we get older. This means our earlobes sag and become larger over time. But not only that, the rest of our face changes too while aging. Our lips and cheeks, for example, rather shrink than grow. And with the loss of volume there, our ears appear even bigger. The same also applies for our nose!
Fact 2: Your heart rate can sync up with music you’re listening to
You might not believe it, but the music you are listening to can actually affect you physiologically. Your blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration are mirroring the tempo and intensity of the songs you are listening to. Songs with increases in volume and intensity (crescendos) can make your blood pressure, heart rate and breathing increase too. The same applies to songs with decreases in volume and intensity (decrescendos) and silent periods. Here, it shows the opposite effect with decreases in these vitals. Moreover, repeated rhythms in music can cause your cardiovascular system to synchronize with the beat.
Fact 3: Brain information travels up to 430 kilometers per hour
Electrical signals sent by brain cells travel down long axons, linking different regions of the brain, where they are received by other brain cells. This is how information flow to and from the brain. And this is also the reason why we are able to do so many things in our daily lives. It is hard to imagine, but you use your brain continuously all the time, which is why information have to travel so quickly.
Fact 4: Babies blink less than adults do
In fact, studies show that babies only blink once or twice a minute, while adults blink 10 to 15 times a minute. One explanation for this could be that, because infants have an incomplete ability to see, they have to work harder to soak up visual information. Another theory states that babies don’t have to blink that much because they sleep a lot and also have smaller eyes. Therefore, the removal of dirt or debris from the surface of the eye is not needed that much.
Fact 5: Our body contains more than 100.000 kilometers of blood vessels
That means if they were taken out and laid end on end, they would be long enough to travel around the world more than two times. But what do we need these blood vessels for? The answer is quite simple: They carry our blood throughout our body.
Together with the heart and the heart vessels, they form your circulation system. The main functions are getting enough oxygen and nutrients everywhere we need them, protecting and healing from diseases, and getting rid of waste products. So basically, your whole body’s functioning depends on it.
sources:
https://www.flushinghospital.org/newsletter/truth-or-myth-our-nose-and-our-ears-never-stop-growing/ (29.11.2022, Michael Hinck )
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/body/21640-blood-vessels (Cleveland Clinic medical professional, 29.11.2022)
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/09/health/09real.html (Anahas O’Connor, 29.11.2022)
https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/numbers-the-nervous-system-from-268-mph-signals-to-trillions-of-synapses (Valerie Ross, 29.11.2022)
https://integrisok.com/resources/on-your-health/2021/january/facts-about-the-human-body-you-never-knew (integrisok editors, 29.11.2022)