Geek Out: A Skeleton Is For Life
Yoghurt:
Normally, when we get to see brains, nerves or the spinal cord, they’ve been preserved in formaldehyde which prevents them from decaying but gives them a much firmer texture in the jar than they actually have in life.
22 bones:
Our skull is made up of 14 facial bones (true some of them are tiny) and 8 cranial (head) bones.
Red bone marrow:
We’re born with red bone marrow throughout our skeleton. Gradually, much of this gets replaced by yellow bone marrow (great for fat storage, that’s why your dog likes to chew on bones) and by the time we’re an adult, really only our cranial bones, vertebrae, sternum (breast bone), os coxae (hip bones) and the heads of our femurs (thigh) bones contain red bone marrow.
Calcium:
Apart from bone hardness, calcium is involved in everything from forming blood clots to the release of hormones and the functioning of the nervous system. It would be true to say then that by its storing and timely release, of calcium, the skeleton is vital in preventing us from bleeding to death, the functioning of our endocrine (hormonal) and nervous systems, wow, just wow!
Collagen:
Heard the saying “your face or your figure after 40”? This relates to that collagen loss but also a decrease in the amount of fat beneath the skin (sub-cutaneous fat) as we age. Keeping additional fat beneath the facial skin helps to plump out those wrinkles caused by the loss of collagen, so they’re not quite so obvious!
I’ll leave it to you to decide how you feel about all of the above– I’m just explaining the science!
Splintering into a thousand pieces:
People with osteogenesis imperfecta lack (to varying degrees) boney collagen.
Let’s translate this term.
Anytime you see os – think bone (this comes from Latin), genesis (originally Greek) = to be born. Biologists have corrupted the latter term to mean “produce” so osteogenesis means “production of bones”. Altogether then, this disease name translates as “imperfect production of bones”.
That‘s a general term and could cover a whole load of boney problems but in practice, it’s the medical term for what lay people call “brittle bone disease”. People with this genetic condition (actually it’s a family of related conditions) can be born with broken bones that occur during labor as well as in life, experiencing problems ranging in severity – if you’re interested to know more, click here
Journey from:
The science jargon for this journey is “absorption”
Thyroid and growth hormones:
Thyroid hormone is produced by the thyroid gland in our neck and growth hormone is produced by the pituitary gland in our brain
Walking, running or jump-roping:
Swimming or cycling are wonderful activities with many health benefits but sadly are not great skeleton-stimulators because they’re not “weight-bearing” activities.
