Sheep Heart Dissection Videos

Here's a video that we did about the sheep heart we dissected in anatomy! We labeled all of main heart characteristics, and in the second video we talked about the electrical impulses travelling through the heart.

Sheep Heart Dissection

1. The purpose of the pericardium is to surround and protect the heart. It has two layers- the outer pericardium and the inner peridcardium. The outer pericardium anchors the heart, prevents overstretching, and protects the heart. The inner pericardium has the partiel layer and the visceral layer- and in between that is the pericardial fluid that reduces friction in the heart.

2. Veins are used to carry blood to the heart from the tissues. They have thinner walls that arteries and have one way valves inside of them that block the back flow of blood. Arteries are elastic and contractile to expand when the heart contracts and recoil when it relaxes. Arteries carry blood from the heart to the tissues.

3. The auricle is similar is to an ear like shape, when blood floods into the area, it serves as holding extra blood for the heart, adding extra volume to the heart.

4. The atria seemed to have more fat around it, which may have been the auricle serving as an appendage to the atria, while the ventricles do not have auricles on their external surface.

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7. The chordae tenidae and papillary muscle serve as an anchor of the valves to the heart. This prevents the inversion of the valves with every contraction and relaxation.

8. The bicuspid valve is a dual flap valve. It is between the left atria and the left ventricle and is anchored to the endocardium by the chordae tenidae and papillary muscle that prevent the inversion of the valve.



9. The semi-lunar valves prevent arterial blood from entering the heart. They are two main ones in the heart - the pulmonary semi-lunar valve. and the aortic semi-lunar valves.

10a.  If there was a blockage in the right side of the heart, that means that there would be back flow into the superior and inferior vena cava. The inferior vena cava would be most affected due to gravity, and since it is an artery, it has no one way valves to prevent this back flow either. Gravity would then make the blood flow down to the lower extremities, causing feet and ankles to swell.

10b. The left side of the heart is responsible for pumping oxygenated blood to the body. If there was a blockage on the left side, I would expect to see back flow into the lungs, since blood enters the left side of the body through the pulmonary veins. There would likely be some heaviness in the chest, as well as difficulty breathing from the blood pooling in the lungs.

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12. The left side of the heart deals with oxygenated blood while the right side deals with oxygenated blood. The left side of the heart is also a bit thicker, especially in the left ventricle because it needs to be strong enough to deliver blood up and over the aorta and to the entire body. The right ventricle on the other hand has a thinner myocardium wall since it only needs to deliver blood to the lungs.

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Unit 3 Reflection

This unit was about the cardiovascular and respiratory systems. The cardiovascular system works through a system of blood vessels, organs, and accessory organs that help the system function. Examples of main organs would be the heart, and examples of accessory organs would be the kidney, liver, small and large intestines. Since the circulatory system is needed to transport oxygen and nutrients to the billions of cells in your body, as well as transport away waste such as urea and carbon dioxide; the system is vitally important to the functions of the body. To better understand the different parts of the heart and the pathway that blood flows through the heart we drew a heart of chalk and walked through it.

In the video we say that the blood enters from the left pulmonary vein into the right atrium, but that was a mistake on our part, we meant to say left. 

The importance of the circulatory system is what makes cardiovascular diseases such as strokes or heart attacks so life threatening. "1.5 million heart attacks in the United Staes occur each year with 500,000 deaths" (Women's Heart Foundation). A heart attack is when blood supply to the myocardium is severely reduced or stopped resulting in damage to the heart cells or death of heart cells. It is usually when one or more of the coronary arteries is blocked, and is often caused by atherosclerosis. It can also be called: myocardial infarction (MI), coronary occlusion, coronary thrombosis. Easily mistaken as a heart attack, a stroke is a brain injury that occurs when blood supply to part of the brain is interrupted. It can also be called a CVA or a cerebrovascular accident.

To avoid cardiovascular disease, people should be aware to how they are treating their bodies. They should monitor  their blood pressure (especially since 40-90% of all stroke victims had high BP before their stroke), control their cholesterol levels, stop/never start smoking, exercise, manage stress, eat a healthy diet, drink alcohol in moderation, monitor their chances of diabetes, and control their weight.

This unit was really interesting to me, but I felt that I missed out on some parts since I was gone for majority of the sheep heart dissection that we did in class.  I felt that I actually understood the material pretty well, and studied by making my own flashcards with pictures and went back to make sure I could understand the essential questions and vocab of each unit. But I think that when I took the test I started to stress myself out and second guess myself, and from there it spiraled down even though I knew the material. This unit in itself went pretty well, but there were some technical issues that I had with the blog that added extra stress and I started to psych myself out before I even took the test. To compare to the Unit 2 Goals, I think that I actually improved on some aspects of them, including sleep, but I think I need to update my goals since a lot of things happened since I created them. For the remainder of the semester, I want to focus on getting back on track with school and grades since I realized that no matter how hard I try at studying, nothing's going to change if I don't change other parts of my life first.

 

Monday Wellness Reflection

For our Monday Wellness Topic- we chose to study the benefits and harms that snacking has on the body and how to avoid unhealthy snacking. Snacking is often overlooked in favor of education of the larger meals of the day - breakfast, lunch, and dinner - but in the end what you do between those meals also greatly affects your health and metabolism. One of the most interesting things that I learned through this presentation was how other countries also viewed American snacking. We featured a video about "Italians tasting American Snacks" by Buzzfeed, and seeing their reaction to American food and how they urged Americans that "There are better things to eat" really showed how unhealthy snacking is something that's ingrained into American society. Without healthy snacking, it does not matter how healthy you eat overall, because all positive effects are reversed when you increase your LDL levels or sodium levels when you snack. Overall, I would grade ourselves a 9.5 because we did go over time slightly, despite our best intentions, and there were some parts of the presentation that did not flow as smoothly as other parts.
When we were researching, it was interesting to see how many aspects of health in general were affected by unhealthy snacking and how many scholarly reports were published on it as well. I thought that it was great that so many people were looking into the repercussions that snacking was causing on the American diet, but surprised that despite that, American's are still known for eating unhealthy foods and drinks on a daily basis. I think that if these articles and reports were taken more seriously and not just as a suggestion, the overall American diet could become much healthier. The effects really are not something to be taken lightly either. By increasing your LDL rate and lowering/not changing your HDL, you can cause atherosclerosis, which is the build up of fatty material deposits in the blood vessels, making it harder for blood to flow in them and causing a clot to form, which can then lead to an aneurysm and high blood pressure. Insulin and leptin resistance can also occur, along with the formation of type 2 diabetes, which needs constant monitoring for the rest of the individuals life. As we showed in our Monday Wellness, eating a healthy snacks is not that hard to do, and it can be a fun activity too. I thought that everyone really enjoyed making the apple monsters, but I was worried that some may not repeat the process at home because all in all, grabbing a bag of Hot Cheetos is easier than preparing a healthy homemade snack. I think that's also a part of American society that has to change, because people need to be willing to make the effort to eat healthier if they want to be healthier. Without that change, the whole purpose of all the reports and articles written become essentially useless, because if people are not going to change their lifestyles to eat healthier, it won't matter if they were aware of the repercussions and consequences of their actions since those negative health effects would happen anyways.

Blood Pressure

In this lab, we learned about how to take blood pressure and what blood pressure means. Blood pressure is the force exerted by the blood against the inner walls of the blood vessels. Your blood pressure is higher when your heard beats compared to when the heart is relaxed. When looking at a blood pressure gauge, it is clear to see when the heart is beating because the needle pauses and moves up slightly. Blood pressure needs to be maintained, and high blood pressure is a major risk of cardiac health.

We recorded the blood pressure and bpm of ourselves and our lab partner. Our bpm was measured in the following locations: radial artery(wrist), carotid artery(neck), and at the common location of the chest. We also measured blood pressure with a stethoscope and a sphygmomanometer. 

Unit 2 Reflection

Health is the measure of our body's efficiency and over all well-being. This unit, we evaluated how healthy we are by using a sleep diary, tracking our foods, and doing various activities in class. When we started out, I wasn't aware how many aspects of my life were unhealthy, but after this unit, I realize what I need to change in order to have a healthy lifestyle. Unfortunately, others at my school live the same lifestyle that I did before this unit started, so even though SHS advocates health, the students rarely act on it. In order to improve health on campus, I think that we should integrate it more into our daily school lives as opposed to one-time assemblies advocating health.

One of the themes for this unit was being able to tell when someone is healthy or not, and what could be used in order to be healthy by learning about nutrition, sleep, stress, exercise, and social connections. I learned that in order to be truly healthy, you need to balance all of these pillars of health, instead of only maintaining two or three like most students do.

I felt that in this unit we could have had more emphasis on social connections. We had a potluck to advocate for it, but only talked on the superficial level on why we needed social connections as opposed to thinking of ways to maintain them and how to open up to someone when you need help, because even though students have those social connections, many ignore them when they are in need of help. For one of our assignments, we had to read a book about health from our school's library, and the book I chose was "Managing Your Depression: What you can do to feel better". This book was really good at making real life connections, and explained what it meant to have a healthy social connection by explaining the job of a counselor. Many students at SHS are afraid of going to their counselor when they have a problem for the simple reason of not wanting their college applications to be affected when the time comes. It seems that it would be better to reflect the image of a happy healthy student rather than one who was struggling through depression when it came time for a rec. This book focused on getting past that stigma, and by offering a real world connection, it made a big impact. 

Lastly, we had to fill out a health goals sheet on how we wanted to improve our health, and here's mine :) 

Nutrition Analysis

Friday, September 18th, 2015

Tuesday, September 18th, 2015

Wednesday, September 16th, 2015

          In Anatomy, we learned about nutrition and the different ways that it can affect your health. One of the ways that we learned about it was by tracking our own diets and comparing them to what they should be at. Above is the data that I collected for my diet in three days. This data was tracked using SuperTracker, which is sponsored by the USDA, the U.S. Department of Agriculture.  My data fluctuated a bit because of the events of that day. I was under my projected caloric need, which was 1800 calories, for all 3 days I monitored my diet. On Tuesday, I ended up skipping breakfast and lunch since I was running late to school in the morning, and helping a friend on her project during lunch. For a snack once I got home, I had a piece of toast, which is why my refined grains for that day exceeds the amount recommended, as did my sodium. On Wednesday, I tried to cut back on the amount of sodium I was eating, and made it under the recommended 2300mg limit, instead getting 1800mg. However, I then exceeded the empty calorie limit by eating 341 empty calories instead of 161 empty calories.  On Friday, I did not actively monitor my sodium levels, and I exceeded them. I also ended up exceeding the empty calorie limit once again. 

In order to improve my diet, I believe that I should cut back on empty calories and sodium, and focus more on fruits and vegetables. I also believe that I should eat more protein to bring it to at least the level that it was on Wednesday. I think that Wednesday was my most balanced day, since I kept under the sodium limit, although I exceeded the empty calorie one. If I added more vegetables and dairy to my diet, I believe that it would become more balanced without causing a deficiency in any of the groups. 

In class, we also completed an activity called Falcon Market, where we explored the different foods available to us. It was surprising how many brands and types of food evaded listing trans fat explicitly on their ingredient list. If a food has less than 1 gram of trans fat, they do not have to list it in the nutrition box. However, it still must be on the ingredient list, but companies avidly try to hide this by using synonyms for trans fat, such as : "partially hydrogenated, "hydrogenated" and "leavening" . It was also surprising to learn how much healthier I could be eating when eating at fast-food restaurants. For example, at McDonald's I usually order a McChicken, but after comparing nutrition facts, I realized that a healthier option to order would be a regular hamburger. The same went for my drinks at Starbucks. My two favorite drinks: the Mocha Frappuccino and Pumpkin Spice Latter were overloaded with sugar, which I had previously been aware of, but I never thought that it would have as much added sugar as it did have. 

If I had the opportunity and coach someone on proper health and nutrition, I would start by making sure that they were getting adequate nutrients from each of the food groups, since a deficiency or excess in one may lead to future health problems. I would encourage them to also get exercise throughout the week, and to cut back or actively monitor their empty calories and sodium intake, since foods all around us today are packed with them, and those levels can quickly get out of hand. 

The Pillars of Health

Health to me means being able to be happy and fit in both mental and physical aspects. A good way to do a quick check to see if you are healthy is to compare your daily lifestyle to the standars of the five pillars of health. The five pillars are: exercise, sleep, social, nutrition, and stress. Making sure that you have an adequate amount (and not too much) of each of these pillars can ensure a healthy lifestyle. Personally, I believe I am strongest in the pillars of social, nutrition, and exercise. The pillars that I need to most improve on are the areas of stress/ stress management and sleep. In terms of health, I'm most interested in learning on how our body changes and adapts when one of these pillars is disrupted, and what a body in total sync with the pillars looks like as well.  I am also interested in learning about diseases and other repercussions that can occur when one of the pillars is not met (e.g not meeting the standards for health can result in Type 2 Diabetes). 

Unit 1 Reflection

Unit One Reflection:

This unit in Anatomy and Physiology was focused about macromolecules, and types of tissues. The main theme of this unit is histology and how structure fits function. In the class, we learned about the different types of tissues, their structure, and their function. The different tissues we learned about were epithelial, connective, muscular, and nervous. Another theme was homeostasis and hierarchy. Homeostasis is the maintaining a stable internal environment. An example of homeostasis is the hypothalamus above the roof of your moth that senses your temperature and reacts in a negative feedback loop to it. Hierarchy is also an umbrella theme in Anatomy. The main configuration of hierarchy goes from atom , molecules, macromolecules, organelles, cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, organisms, populations, communities, ecosystems, biomes, and biospheres. Anatomy generally focuses on the layers of organelles to organisms.
   


I think that I didn't really understand how all the tissues came together in the end, and how they work together to ensure homeostasis in the body. I know what they all do individually, and what their structure and functions are, but it not how they all come together in the end. In this unit, we completed the dissection of Hana the Banana, the sugar lab, and tissue lab. From Hana the Banana we learned about the anatomical positions, such as superior/inferior, and anterior/posterior. From the sugar lab, we learned about the structure of polysaccharides such as cellulose and starch, and how they do not taste sweet in comparison to disaccharides and monosaccharides such as sucrose and glucose.

This unit helped us understand histology more, and in turn that helped us understand what a histologist does. A histologist "examines and analyzes cells and body fluids". They must also be able to match blood types for blood transfusions, and test blood levels in the blood.

All About Tissues!

For this lab, we learned and observed the different types of tissues in a microscope. One of my favorite tissues was the bone, which is a specialized connective tissue with a black center and a speckled gray pattern around it (shown in center). The dark center is the area that blood would flow through (where the vessel would go) and the rings around it represent the bone that surrounds it.

In the tissues, we can really see the theme of form fitting function taking place. Epithelial tissue for example, changes depending on where it is located in the body. If it is lining a gland, such as the thyroid, it can be seen in simple columnar form. However, if it on the skin, it is usually stratified, differing between squamous, cuboidal and columnar. It has a basement layer, called a basal lamina that latches it to the connective tissue underneath.  Nervous tissue on the other hand, is full of neurons and the supporting neurological cells. It can be seen as more "stringy", with clumps representing the center of the cell and dendrites pushing out of the top, sending electrical impulses. The pulses also travel down the axon to the other set of dendrites at the end, connecting each the neurons together. Even in the same tissue we can see differences. Skeletal muscle for example, has striations and is multi-nucleate. Smooth muscle on the other hand, has no striations and is spindle shaped. The third type, cardiac muscle, is branched with striations, but is uni-nucleate. It is through the different anatomy of the tissues and their subparts that we can see the theme of form fits function even more clearly.

The Scoop on Stem Cells

"Stem cells (center ones) can develop into any cell type. They are valuable as research tools and might, in the future, be used to treat a wide range of diseases. " (News Medical)

                                                         Credit: Judith Stoffer


Stem cells are "unspecialized" cells that have the potential and ability to become any cell in the body. A major characteristic of stem cells is their ability to multiply while maintaining the ability to become any cell in the body. However, the term stem cell is a generic term. There are many different type of stem cells: embryonic stem cells, adult stem cells, induced pluripotent cells (iPS), and pluripotent stem cells (PS). Some stem cells, such as those in bone marrow, can divide and replace worn out tissue. Embryonic stem cells can divide without differentiation for long periods of time, and are known to develop into cells and tissue of the three primary germ layers, the ectoderm, mesoderm, and endoderm.  Adult stem cells are found in organs and many tissues with a limited ability for self renewal and differentiation. They vary in their ability for differentiation, but they are usually limited to cell types of their cell of origin. This topic is still being investigated by scientists today. Induced pluripotent cells are adult cells that are reprogrammed to enter the embryonic cell stage. They do this by being forced to express factors that are important in maintain the cells. iPSC's were first found in 2006 inside of a mouse, by Takahashi and Yamanaka, and the first human ones were found the year after, by Takahashi and Yu. iPSC's have some characteristics of embryonic stem cells, and scientists are comparing the two to find important similarities and differences.

Stem cells are valuable resources and cells in our body that can be used to solve a variety of problems, and some scientists are looking towards stem cells as the answer to serious diseases such as cancer.

Sources:
Mandal, Ananya, Dr. "What Are Stem Cells?" News-Medical.net. News Medical, 10 Jan. 2010. Web. 31 Aug. 2015.

"Frequently Asked Questions." Stem Cell Basics: Introduction [Stem Cell Information]. National Institute of Health, Mar.-Apr. 2015. Web. 31 Aug. 2015.

Medical News Today. MediLexicon International, n.d. Web. 31 Aug. 2015.

A Pretty Sweet Lab!

Today, we tested the monomers of the macro-molecule carbohydrates . The monomers of carbs are sugars, or monosaccharides. We tested common sugars and measured their degrees of sweetness to see what the difference between each monomer was. The monomers we tested were : glucose, fructose, galactose,  lactose, maltose, sucrose, starch, and cellulose.  Glucose, fructose, and galactose are classified as monosaccharides, meaning that they only have one ring. Maltose, and lactose were disaccharides, meaning that they have two rings. Starch and cellulose are polysaccharides, so they were composed of many rings. We noticed an inverse relationship between the number of rings that each monomer had and the degree of sweetness that we measured. For example, we rated fructose as having a 100 degree of sweetness, while starch and cellulose each got a 0. So we concluded that as the number of rings went up, the degree of sweetness went down.
As the lab continued, we found it easy to relate these carbohydrates to foods that we had eaten before. Fructose tasted similar to honey, since it was really sweet. Cellulose, on the other hand, reminded us of paper, which made sense when we learned that cellulose is a main component of paper. Starch vaguely reminded us of vegetables, which also was a expected since starch is produced by many green plants.

After the lab, we decided to to an extension to see how humans tasted sweetness. According to NPR, the taste buds have about 50-100 taste cells on the outer tips of the bud, and a different percentage of buds taste sweetness, while other percentages taste salty, sour, bitter etc.. There are proteins on the tongue specifically for tasting sweetness, and a chemical reaction takes place when the sugar or sweetener encounters the protein. It sends a signal to the brain, and different parts of the central nervous system respond to the sweetness.


Source: "Getting a Sense of How We Taste Sweetness." NPR. NPR, 11 Mar. 2011. Web. 29 Aug. 2015.

Hana the Banana in her cabana in the savannah

Last week, we investigated the death of Hana the banana who was murdered in her banana in the savanna. After we marked all the external lacerations, we opened up Hana using a scalpel along the sagittiral plane. In the end, it was determined that Hana had died due to blunt force trauma to the posterior of the cranium.