Page 118 - South Mississippi Living - June, 2024

118 | June 2024
www.smliving.net | SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living
A BIOLOGICAL
Masterpiece
We all have one. Our daily activities would be impossible without it. It is a biological vessel
that carries us from place to place, allowing us to experience all that life has to offer. It only asks that
we care for it properly and nurture it as if our life depends on it, because it does. This intricate vessel is
our body. But what else is our body capable of? Let us dive deeper into the brilliant and complex capabilities of the human body.
As a newborn baby, we have around 300 bones in our tiny bodies. By early adulthood, we are down to 206. So, what happens? As we grow, our bones fuse
together to create larger ones.
Although our bodies have a complex muscular system, our strongest muscle may not
be so obvious. The masseter (jaw) muscle is responsible for our everyday activities such as speaking and chewing and has a bite force of up to almost one thousand pounds!
Our bodies carry up to six pounds of microbes. Our body mass consists of up to three percent of these bacteria and fungi, and these microbes have their own set of chores, from aiding us in digestion and cleaning our skin.
The liver can heal itself. Of course this depends on the severity of the damage, but our liver can regenerate itself, even if part of it is removed during surgery. This
regeneration can happen as quickly as a few weeks to several months.
Our bodies work as a temperature regulator by maintaining an internal average temperature of 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, regardless of the environment. It does this by causing us to sweat and shiver, and by performing processes such as vasoconstriction
and vasodilation, where our blood vessels shrink or expand.
The human body is capable of an array of functions, from the fusion of bones that
shape our skeletal framework to regulating our internal temperature regardless of our surrounding elements. As our body maintains its balance, working to keep us healthy and alive, we see that it is more than simply a vessel. The human body is a biological
masterpiece dedicated to our well-being.
story by Brittany Smith