Archive for the ‘Your Amazing Body Series’ category

Your Amazing Body Series 5 – Fat Cells

October 24th, 2010

fat cellsAh … the infamous Fat Cell. Is it friend or foe? Actually it’s both depending on you, your lifestyle, and amount of stress experienced in your life be it psychological, physical, or social.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) predicts by the year 2015 one in three people will be obese and have diabetes. Now there’s a sobering thought!

Fat cells have a purpose to store energy for muscles and other cells in the body.

We are all born with millions of fat cells and if you look to the image to your left, you can see what a normal cluster of fat cells look like. These cells are actually filled with liquid and push the nucleus (the “heart” of the cell) out of the way (they have no manners either).

Fat cells grow in response to increased calories consumption and hormones. To name a few, progesterone, estrogen, and cortisol (a stress hormone).  As you gain weight, fat cells grow and multiply. This puts more stress on your heart which needs to pump more blood to fat cells. This is pretty interesting too because the more weight you gain, the more blood vessels the body creates to reach those fat cells to nourish them. Yet when you lose weight, the number of fat cells accumulated stay the same. They just shrink in size.

Most of us don’t think about these annoying fat cells that can really cause havoc with our health in terms of having control over them through lifestyle changes. Getting to know these potentially troublesome cells could be a way for you to decide if you want them as a friend or an enemy.

Hmmm ….. would I want greedy fat cells to take over my body and my health? I think not.

Watch this video, great explanation …


Let me know what you think! I’d love to read your comment. Thank you in advance!

ltfsigsmile

Your Amazing Body Series 4 – Stem Cells

October 16th, 2010

stemcellHealing, regenerate, replace, renew is the work of the Stem Cell. They are perhaps the most amazing cell in the body for what they can do. At a very early age of development they can morph into just about any other kind of cell in the body thus bringing back to life, or healing the organ in need.

There are “embryonic” stem cells and “Somatic” (adult) stem cells that have the incredible ability to differentiate themselves.

Stem cells are unique in two significant ways from other cells in the human body. First, they are overspecialized cells and have the ability to renew themselves through cell division if inactive for long periods of time.  Second, stem cells can change into most other cells of the body specific to a particular tissue or organ with specific functions. Imagine that!

Knowing this, the statement that “your body can heal itself” is not mumbo jumbo but a fact.  The fact that Stem Cells can repair worn out or damaged cells in various organs is inspirational. I would think motivational too in an enlightening way – to take better care of ourselves because when doing so we enable the communities within our bodies to work batter and more harmoniously, which = better, optimal health.

But I always ask the question, where does all the energy come from? All the activities of our cells use up energy to travel, to cell divide, to morph, to carry nutrients or rid them, to make up who we are … it’s fascinating. Dr. Bruce Lipton has a theory about energy and cellular communication that will really get you scratching your head.

Watch this video which explains how Stem Cells work and why they are so, so very special and important in healing and saving the lives of others …

If you liked this post or have thoughts about it, leave a comment. Would love to read it. Thank you in advance for your visit.

ltfsigsmile

Your Amazing Body Series 3 – Neurons

October 9th, 2010

nerve cell Ah, the neuron is one of my absolute favorite cells of the body, aside from the stem cell which I’ll be writing about soon.

The neuron is mysterious, magical, powerful, and its function and strength in ability grows when it is in communication, or in a community of other neurons.  By itself it loses it’s ability to function but is inspired to “create”, generate those mental activities we call “thoughts”, “ideas”, “feelings”, and “brainstorming”.

Neurons are fascinating. They are the cells that help us to understand our physical world through sensation, touch, the other senses, stimuli that is transmitted to the brain to decode and translate into understanding.  Absolutely amazing.

As you watch the below video, you may wonder as I did – where does all that energy come from? And how would our bodies act without these important cells?

Here are a few VERY interesting facts about neurons – complements of  Serendip .  Did you know:

  • Average number of neurons in the human brain= 100 billion
  • Average number of neurons in an octopus brain= 300 billion
  • Rate of neuron growth during development of a fetus (in the womb)= 250,000 neurons/minute
  • Diameter of a neuron= 4 to 100 microns
  • Longest axon of a neuron= around 15 feet (Giraffe primary afferent axon from toe to neck)
  • Velocity of a signal transmitted through a neuron= 1.2 to 250 miles/hour

These numbers can change.

Here is a really interesting article on neurons from the Society for Neuroscience if you want to explore more …

Enjoy this amazing video on the Neuron – we are wired to network … :-)


If you liked this post, let me know what you think by leaving a comment below. Thanks you in advance!

ltfsigsmile