Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Research (Unconscious Minds)

I have created this comic called Unconscious Mind (research) to show information on a current research in the medical science of the mind. I know this topic also deals with psychology, but after reading this article called Unconscious Processing: Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know it is clear that not all unconscious processing is just brain activity, but how that brain activity effects the body and homeostasis. I have learned about this recently in pyschology & about muscles in anatomy, so I have some prior knowledge to the subject. This cartoon is just a fun/cute way to describe to bare minimum of what I got out of this research. I realize how it impacts everyones daily lives and so I thought it would be interesting to read more about.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Skeletal Muscle Tissue - Muscle Anatomy

Our anatomy class is working to finish understanding the muscle system before Christmas break is here, so we have divided it into 3 different sections that all the class will work on and then teach to people studying the other sections. The 3 parts include: muscle anatomy, sliding filament model, and neuromuscular junction. Sierra, Sidney, and I decided to do the muscle anatomy. To display our learnings and to present what we learned for others is we created a poster on which we drew, colored, and labeled the anatomy.

Let's take a moment to break this poster down...
Our first view is looking at the muscle as a whole:
This shows the bulk of the muscle. If you were to look at a specific muscle such as the bicep or tricep this is the anatomy you would find. Some major parts in this section is the muscle belly and the triad.
The second section we will be looking at is an extension of one of the fasicals to show even the smaller break down of muscles. 
We broke down each of these fasicals all the way inside a single muscle fiber to the myofibril which is the contractible unit of the muscle.
Lastly, this is a very detailed diagram of the contractible bands in the muscle. 
This is a break down of muscle anatomy. We had fun making this poster and we also learned a ton about this structure. I think we did very well on this poster and our understanding is at a proficient level. Next steps will include learning what the others have to teach us about the other 2 sections and in return teaching them about muscle anatomy. This was a great way to incorporate experience in working with a group and community teaching. Helping to teach others in ways that we understand the best; its not text book talk, its people to people talk, real talk, and that makes the learning experience even that much better!
Hope you enjoyed my post! Have a great day! :)

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Electromyogram (EMG) Lab Analysis

My anatomy class is learning about muscles and we decided a fun way to kick off this section would be with an EMG lab. EMG is a graphical recording of electrical activity within muscles. Activation of muscles by nerves results in changes in ion flow across cell membranes, which generate electrical activity. Our objectives in this lab include: obtain graphical representation of the electrical activity of a muscle, the associate amount of electrical activity with the strength of muscle contraction, and to compare masseter muscle function during different types of chewing activity. We achieved all of these objectives within this lab and learned a lot about this topic while having fun!

Hypothesis:
If we test the jaw while chewing different foods then the foods that are harder will have a bigger max reading on the electrical activity than softer foods because the jaw has to work harder to chew those items.

Materials:
Logger Pro on computer
EKG probe
electrode tabs
different foods with varying hardness
experimentalist to chew the food


Procedure:
1. Open Logger Pro. Connect the correct cords to the computer and the probers to face of the experimental body's lower jaw and and upper jaw with the electrode tabs.
2. Start the data collection by having the experimentalist relax their jaw for 5 seconds while recording and then clench for 5 seconds.
3. Use the next set of data collection to compare the muscle action in the chewing of different foods. Use the foods you have selected. Have the experimentalist put them in their mouth, then start the data collection. Allow them to rest their jaw for 5 seconds and then tell them to chew until swallowing and the graph will record the difference.
4. Repeat this action until all food types are tried.

Data:

Data Analysis:
From this data we can see that some of the foods that we chewed caused a higher or lower electrical activity in the jaw muscle. We will use the clenching as the average chewing activity. Our experimentalist had a .6 in his change of mV as you can see on our chart. Everything after this shows the different hardnesses in electrical activity during chewing. We found that out of the food we tested beef jerky (change of 1.6 mv)used the most jaw power and had the most electrical activity while chewing and that pudding and straw (mild sucking) caused the least jaw power and electrical activity with a change of .1 in mV. The other food was ranked anywhere in between these two numbers (max and min), however none were exactly the same as the average clenching of the jaw.

Conclusion:
By following the correct procedures and collecting our data our hypothesis was true. It is true that if we test the jaw while chewing different foods then the foods that are harder will have a bigger max reading on the electrical activity than softer foods because the jaw has to work harder to chew those items. Our graph and analysis prove our hypothesis to be right. We had a lot of fun doing the activity as well which makes it even better!

Reflection:
I feel like this lab was a great way to start off our muscle systems series! It really helped me to think about the muscles that we use daily and never really think about. That is very important to recognize because when you're sore that can be a warning sign telling you you have been using different muscles and to not over do it, but work at strengthening them. This is something that can help us to be cautious and know our bodies a little better.
Patterns that I saw in the different foods in this particular where that the harder the item to chew was the bigger change it had in mV. This was relatable to our hypothesis which was later proven to be true!
I feel like all through out this lab my group worked diagently and well together. We also collected accurate data and had a fun time doing it so I would say this was a successful project and that I did good. Next steps could include other muscles electrical activities to see which muscles cause large changes in mV or other projects that could be linked to this data such as just even testing a wider variety in food or even extending to non foods and just biting down on them.

Overall, our project was a great success. I hope this helped you to undersand our lab and a little bit about electrial activity in the jaw when you chew certain foods.


PS- don't forget to chew your food!!

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Bone - skeletal system

     This prezi displays all that I learned about bones. In this prezi I broke the topic of bone into 3 different categories. These categories included bone structure, bone development and growth, and bone fractures and breaks. I did 3 sub categories for each of these topics and then a few even have subtopics within the subtopics. This is a rather large post but it shows all that I know. 
     For a short piece of self-reflection I would say that I really like using Prezi because it helps me to remember the information much better than the book or notes or lectures. The whole idea of me picking the information to use and typing it myself really helps me to remember the facts. I can use this information again when I take classes for nursing, when I biology, and even in everyday life. Soon we will learn all of the bones in the body so I could help others know which bones are where, I know which parts of the body has little bones that we must be careful about, and I may be able to help determine breaks and fractures and on which bone they may be located. I feel like I'm learning pretty quickly as I go, but this is a hard subject so I'll need to pay attention. Next steps include learning all the bones of the body and finishing up the skeletal system. Overall things are going well and looking positive as I move along! Check out my post and enjoy it :)

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Integumentary System (skin/cancer/burns)

This Prezi that I have created goes over all I have learned from the Integumentary System. There was a lot to cover and this is a rather large post, but I learned a lot about skin, cancer, and burns so I felt I needed to share it all. I hope my blog can help you learn as well as it helped me. 

Just for a short self-reflection:
1. I could use this again in life, hope to be a nurse practitioner so I'm sure I will need to know how to detect skin-cancer and burns. I'll also need to give advise about how to take care of the skin.
2. Patterns that I saw were that there are always progressively worse stages in medical conditions such as first, second, and third degree burns & the basal, squamous, and melanoma cancers.
3. I fell like I picked up on each of these topics very well and I have a solid base of each of these categories of understanding. Next, I can just keep applying it to other parts of science and building my knowledge of these topics.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Tissue Engineered Skin

This Popplet, Tissue Engineered Skin, is a breif summary of the article that we read, The Bionic Body. I made this post in order to fufill Standard 2 - Research on my profile.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

A&P FUNK (directional terms, body planes, body cavities)

 

This is my group (Steven, Audie, and I) video called A&P Funk. Our video reviews directional terms, body planes, and body cavities. It can be an easy way to help remember these things and a fun way to learn. Check it out :)

Friday, October 14, 2011

HISTOLOGY!!

This Prezi took me FOREVER!! It contains connective, muscle, and nervous tissues (epithelial is on previous post). Our histology lab is also on this post. It's a large post, but very informational :) I've learned a lot from this post. Writing all of these out with descriptions, functions, locations, and pictures has helped me to remember each type and what they look like. I hope my post can do the same for you :) ENJOY

Friday, October 7, 2011

Epithelial Tissue - PREZI

Epithelial Tissue


Use this link to check out my prezi about epithelial tissue. I learned from making this prezi
and it helped me to remember the different types, hopefully it can help you too! :)

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Homeostasis Lab








Preforming this lab helped to lock in exactly what homeostasis does and how it works. Although I already understood how homeostasis worked, this lab helped to show the process in action, revealing to me just how quick and effective it really is.

Friday, September 9, 2011

Homeostasis


(Taken from Hole's Anatomy)
Homeostasis is a property or quality of multicellular organism's systems that allow us to maintain a stable environment. To break that down and make it even a little more understandable, we can say homeostasis is a natural quality we have within us to keep a constant internal environment. In order for the body to maintain this internal environment, there are self-regulating control systems through which our body does this process. These control systems have 3 parts to them: Receptors, the control center, and effectors.

  • Receptors: provide information about specific conditions in the internal environment. A receptor may be a molecule or a cell or even a system. The receptor detects the bodies need and then contacts the control center.
  • Control Center: includes a set point (target value of a physiological measure maintained automatically in the body), which tells a particular value should be. An example would include human body temperature at 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. This center gets the information from the receptor, reads where the body is at compared to where it needs to be, and sends the mission to the effectors.
  • Effectors: can be muscles or glands, which cause responses that alter conditions in the internal environment. Once the effector has the mission it breaks that down into understandable terms for the body to read and it changes the condition or tries to make up for the irregular functions to keep the body stable.

(Taken from Hole's Anatomy)
These 3 parts are referred to as a "homeostatic mechanism". This homeostatic mechanism works together when the receptor measures your stability from the set point and the effectors are activated to fix the variables that are off. As the conditions return to normal, the effectors gradually shut down because they have done their job and this process is refered to as negative feedback. The image 1.7 shows us an example of how all the reactors work together to get the room temperature back to normal. Another example of negative feedback would be when you are running and your body starts to heat up. When it heats up, your body starts to sweat causing beads of water to evolve on your skin. As you run, this perspiration begins to evaporate working in a way that cools the body. The sweat ether evaporates into the air or soaks into your jersey keeping you cool and in a sense working as a type of air conditioner. This homeostatic mechanism works to maintain body temperature and cause you not to overheat. Although most body feedback is negative, there is a chance that on occasion you'll see some positive feedback. Positive feedback is a process that moves conditions away from the normal state. Examples of positive feedback include things such as woman's contractions at birth, AIDS, and blood clotting. I'll explain AIDS for a better understanding: when AIDS is in a human system at the beginning of the virus just certain cells in your body are effected, but as the process go on your body multiples the virus and engraves it into your DNA rather than try to fix the problem. This example, like most other positive feedback is not looked upon as good, but not all positive feedback has to have such negative connotations. For example contractions around the birthing period are very well looked upon. A woman has one contraction and that leads to another and another and they build up to help the mother deliver her baby. Positive feedback happens on a much rarer occasion, but it can happen so keep it in mind as well.  

Homeostatis in general is just the process of keeping our bodies in a normal, stable environment. I've learned about the different parts of the homeostatic mechanicisms and about positive and negative feedback. I hope I may have been some help to you as well trying to break down the textbooks and just give you the simple explanation of all this "stuff".

----------------------------------------------------->>>
--------------------------------------->>>
------------------------>>>

check out this video its a great explaination of
other parts of homeostasis I didn't cover!!