1 – Body Position Affects Your Memory
Can’t remember your anniversary, hubby? Try getting down on one knee.
Memories are highly embodied in our senses. A scent or sound may
evoke a distant episode from one’s childhood. The connections can be
obvious (a bicycle bell makes you remember your old paper route) or
inscrutable. A recent study helps decipher some of this embodiment. An
article in the January 2007 issue of Cognition reports that episodes from
your past are remembered faster and better while in a body position
similar to the pose struck during the event.
2 – Your Skin Has Four Colors
All skin, without coloring, would appear creamy white. Near-surface blood
vessels add a blush of red. A yellow pigment also tints the canvas. Lastly,
sepia-toned melanin, created in response to ultraviolet rays, appears
black in large amounts. These four hues mix in different proportions to
create the skin colors of all the peoples of Earth.
3 – Big Brains Cause Cramped Mouths
Evolution isn’t perfect. If it were, we might have wings instead of wisdom
teeth. Sometimes useless features stick around in a species simply
because they’re not doing much harm. But wisdom teeth weren’t always
a cash crop for oral surgeons. Long ago, they served as a useful third set
of meat-mashing molars. But as our brains grew our jawbone structure
changed, leaving us with expensively overcrowded mouths.
4 – Your Stomach Secretes Corrosive Acid
There’s one dangerous liquid no airport security can confiscate from you:
It’s in your gut. Your stomach cells secrete hydrochloric acid, a corrosive
compound used to treat metals in the industrial world. It can pickle steel,
but mucous lining the stomach wall keeps this poisonous liquid safely in
the digestive system, breaking down lunch.
5 – Bones Break (Down) to Balance Minerals
In addition to supporting the bag of organs and muscles that is our body,
bones help regulate our calcium levels. Bones contain both phosphorus
and calcium, the latter of which is needed by muscles and nerves. If the
element is in short supply, certain hormones will cause bones to break
downeupping calcium levels in the bodyeuntil the appropriate extracellular
concentration is reached.
6 – Much of a Meal is Food For Thought
Though it makes up only 2 percent of our total body weight, the brain
demands 20 percent of the body’s oxygen and calories. To keep our
noggin well-stocked with resources, three major cerebral arteries are
constantly pumping in oxygen. A blockage or break in one of them
starves brain cells of the energy they require to function, impairing the
functions controlled by that region. This is a stroke.
7 – Thousands of Eggs Unused by Ovaries
When a woman reaches her late 40s or early 50s, the monthly menstrual
cycle that controls her hormone levels and readies ova for insemination
ceases. Her ovaries have been producing less and less estrogen, inciting
physical and emotional changes across her body. Her underdeveloped
egg follicles begin to fail to release ova as regularly as before. The
average adolescent girl has 34,000 underdeveloped egg follicles, although
only 350 or so mature during her life (at the rate of about one per
month). The unused egg follicles then deteriorate. With no potential
pregnancy on the horizon, the brain can stop managing the release of ova.
8 – Puberty Reshapes Brain Structure, Makes for Missed Curfews
We know that hormone-fueled changes in the body are necessary to
encourage growth and ready the body for reproduction. But why is
adolescence so emotionally unpleasant? Hormones like testosterone
actually influence the development of neurons in the brain, and the
changes made to brain structure have many behavioral consequences.
Expect emotional awkwardness, apathy and poor decision-making skills
as regions in the frontal cortex mature.
9 – Cell Hairs Move Mucus
Most cells in our bodies sport hair-like organelles called cilia that help
out with a variety of functions, from digestion to hearing. In the nose,
cilia help to drain mucus from the nasal cavity down to the throat. Cold
weather slows down the draining process, causing a mucus backup that
can leave you with snotty sleeves. Swollen nasal membranes or
condensation can also cause a stuffed schnozzle.
10 – The World Laughs with You
Just as watching someone yawn can induce the behavior in yourself,
recent evidence suggests that laughter is a social cue for mimicry.
Hearing a laugh actually stimulates the brain region associated with
facial movements. Mimicry plays an important role in social interaction.
Cues like sneezing, laughing, crying and yawning may be ways of creating
strong social bonds within a group.
