"Mirroring People" - Marco Iacoboni : Power Hour Reading

For my power hour reading, I chose Mirroring People, by Marco Iacoboni. The chapter I read is called "Monkey See, Monkey Do" and deals with the mirroring neurons in the brain and how our actions and other people's actions are perceived. When we see someone picking up an object - for example a tennis ball - our own neurons fire in response to that to mirror that action, even though we are not performing that action ourselves. This response differs from species to species, in macaque monkeys, these neurons don't fire when a pantomime of an action is being performed, but in humans they do. This is likely because monkeys don't pantomime actions to teach them, but in humans, imitation is key.
One of the experiments mentioned in the book had to do with a 41 minute old baby. Every second of the baby's life was documented to ensure that it had never seen the actions before. A researcher then performed specific actions to the newborn, and the newborn imitated them perfectly even though it had never seen them before. This suggested that newborns don't learn to imitate, they actually learn by imitating, disproving old theories about human imitation and learning. In fact, it's been shown that babies LOVE imitation games. Imitating a baby's movements automatically make you that baby's favorite, and the same is true for all humans of all ages as well. Having someone imitate you in a casual conversation also helps you connect with the other person better, and helps facilitate a better short-term relationship.
The reading seems to be really credible, it specifies many experiments around the globe, and takes into account all of the respective scientists's personal stories and how it could have affected their thought process and methods. The author comments on other experiments and either agrees with their results or hypothesizes a new experiment to test the results further and maybe get different ones. It was nice how he decided to do that since it showed that he was really engaging with the experiments instead of parroting someone else's work.

Coloring Book Page - Almost There

This week I tried to stick with a single pattern when creating my coloring book page. I decided to make it in the outline of the SHS Falcon because I wanted to create something that was a little bit closer to my home and community. I still have to decide how I want the pattern to look like, I tried doing some smaller scale ones on scratch paper but it ended up looking too cluttered. The first pattern I tried was a wave pattern, but it's really easy to mess up the pattern by accidentally shifting it over a little bit, so I decided not to try that one on a larger scale. A pattern that I did really like was this circular pattern that I had seen from a youtube video, and it didn't look too cluttered when I did in on a small scale, but when I made it bigger on the 18x24 paper it looked really messy, so I threw it out and started over.

Because of the series of mistakes and trial and error fails that I did while trying to get the correct design, I didn't get a chance to complete a final coloring page - but I have one thats halfway there right now so hopefully by this weekend I'll be able to update this post with pictures of the completed page :)


UPDATE:
Here's the second coloring book page:

Unit 7 Reflection

In this unit we learned about the different parts of the muscular system and how they worked together to allow the body to move and function. We learned about the different movements of synovial joints, and in order to understand the movements and functions better we created dances to go along with them, using the vocab words like supination, pronation, rotation, and circumduction. It was fun and challenging to try and imitate popular dances like the "macarena" using only anatomy terms.

We got to further explore the different muscle groups in a chicken dissection where we labeled all of the major muscles. The chicken dissection and of the major labeled muscles can be seen at this blog post. Here's a photo that didn't make it onto the blog post, it was interesting and weird to see how there was a hole in the bottom of the chicken where all of the "giblets" were stored.

Next we got into the more molecular based part of how the muscles move, and learned about the different types of fibers that make up our muscles like actin and myosin, and how the two work to make our muscles contract and elongate. The process itself is composed of a variety of steps, and to help us understand the process better, we created a stop-motion muscle contraction video. 

From there, we learned about the individual muscles themselves and the groups that they were a part of, as well as the types of motions that they facilitated and the location of each muscle group. One of the ways that I was able to learn all of the different types of muscles was by creating a concept map that listed the location and motion of each major muscle.

One thing that I would want to learn more about is the structural differences (if any) between voluntary and involuntary muscle groups, and the diseases that affect muscles. Many problems arise because of muscle atrophy, and it would be interesting to see how the atrophy first began and what was causing it. 

As the year starts to come to a close, and finals and AP tests are seen right around the corner, it often feels like I'm sacrificing sleep to keep up with the workload rather than maintaining a balance between the two. I've started to figure out new ways to study so that I'm studying smarter instead of harder, and so far it seems to be working, so hopefully I'll be able to make up for lost hours of sleep. It's at this time that I'm really happy that I chose classes that I'm interested in, like this class and AP Bio, because the homework and studying doesn't really feel like work, it feels more like a project where I get to deepen my knowledge in topics that I already wanted to learn about. 

Performance Enhancing Substances

Performance enhancing substances are used to increase athletic performance, promote muscles growth, and increase an individual's capacity for exercise. Many students take performance enhancing substances to boost their athletic performance, build muscle, increase their body mass or to lose weight. This can be because of the negative influence that society plays with body images, or because of peer pressure. The negatives of steroids outweigh the positives, they can damage a person's mental and physical health and many are illegal. They can also cause "roid rage", mood swings, paranoia, anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts. Most steroids come with negatives, but some like massages and myofascial release help relax the muscles and have no discernible negatives. I think that it's worrisome that there's so many students who are taking steroids, and that they feel like they have to meet some expectation to look a certain way because of external influences, and today people value body image more than their mental and physical health. Below, we created a satirical ad about aging, mimicking the way that many drug companies pitch their product to their consumer base. 

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the dissecting tray!

For this lab we dissected a chicken to observe the various muscle groups and parts to see how they interact with each other. Muscles, bones, and tendons work together to facilitate the movement of the body. The tendon attaches muscle to bone and allows the muscle to work at its full capacity by withstanding the tensile strength and spring of the muscle when it contracts and elongates. 

An example of this is the supinator tendon that works to bend the forearm and rotate it, which is why its called the supinator tendon because it helps with supination. It also works with the biceps brachii muscles that works with other muscles to help with the supination process. 

The origin is where the tendon attaches to a generally immovable bone - some muscles have two or more of these that change their naming conventions - like the triceps and biceps in the arm. The insertion point is where the tendon attaches to a more movable bone. Because of this different in movement, the origin, which is generally stationary, contracts the muscles towards itself while the insertion point is more distal and moves when the muscles contracts. 

In chicken the pectoralis major and minor muscles are generally larger than in humans because chickens are generally bred - through artificial selection and some genetic modification - for their breast meat. They also have a larger tibialis posterior and anterior for the same reasons, artificial selection for a greater supply of chicken meat for consumption. A human's trapezius muscles is much more well defined than that of a chicken, because relative to their body mass, chicken's have a very small head so they do not need a large muscle to control and support it. Humans on the other hand, need large trapezius muscles to help keep the head supported and straight throughout the day. 

Below are pictures that we took during the lab: 

View of skinned chicken before dissection

Pectoralis Major: Movement of the shoulder joint
Pectoralis Minor:  Elevates/Depresses scapula and shoulders

Latissimus Dorsi: Extension, Adduction and Flexion of the shoulder joint
Trapezius: Move the scapula and support the arm/head

Iliotibialis: Extend, adduct, and rotate the hip/leg

Sartorius: Rotater and flexor of the hip joint.

Semitendinosus: Works with other muscles to extend the hip and flex the knee
Biceps femoris: Works for knee extension

Semimembranosus: Leg flexion and rotation, thigh extender

Quadriceps femoris: Powerful knee extenders

Gastrocnemius: Plantar flexing of foot at ankle joint and flexor of leg at knee joint
Tibialis anterior: Dorsiflexion and inversion of the ankle
Peroneus Longus: Evert and plantar flex the ankle

Brachioradialis: Strong elbow flexor
Flexor carpi ulnaris: Flexion and adduction of hand

20 Time - Mickey Mouse

I worked on creating the first coloring page of my book this week. I decided the only true way to kick off the coloring book would be with one of my favorite characters of all time - Mickey Mouse. Going through the steps of finding what to draw and how to fill in the patterns was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. There was the issue of trying to find out what stance to put Mickey in to make sure that the outline was still discernible to the audience, and what patterns to fill up the outline with. I decided that I would try and go for more of a flow-y style with a bunch of circles, but then I realized that it was becoming really monotonous to draw and wasn't giving much style. I added some different patterns, but still tried to make sure that those patterns were repeated enough times since that's part of the reason that coloring books are considered to be a de-stressing tool.

I first sketched out the outline in pencil, and then went over the outline in pen so I could erase the designs inside without worrying about erasing the outline itself. I started off with wide circles and worked my way up the outline, adding mandala patterns to the ear area. After erasing the pencil, I thought it would be fitting to also show the work that my eraser went through, since it started off new. Overall, I think that I could have done better on the pattern, I don't think it goes together very well so I'll probably try just sticking with one repetitive pattern outlined in different shapes than trying to merge a bunch of different ones next time. I'll probably try and make the next one more specific to SHS and Saratoga rather than something general like Disney, so it can affect the community on a more personal scale. 

"What Happens When We Stretch" Article Notes

"Hence when you stretch, the muscle fiber is pulled out to its full length sarcomere by sarcomere, and then the connective tissue take up the remaining slack. When this occurs, it helps to realign any disorganized fibers in the direction of the tension. "
I think that this really shows the importance of stretching. Stretching can be used to help bring scarred tissue back to health, since one of the characteristics of scarred tissue is the fact that it is not aligned with the tissue around it. The connective tissue and muscle fibers work together to make sure that the muscle is stretched as far as it can, and that helps increase the mobility of the muscles when they go back to that stretching position in a workout or an exercise. It would help lengthen your muscles to their full capacity, since your muscles are longest when they are stretched out and when the fibers are as far as they can go.

"Another reason for holding a stretch for a prolonged period of time is to allow this lengthening reaction to occur, thus helping the stretched muscle to relax. It is easier to stretch, or lengthen, a muscles when it is not trying to contract."
This shows the importance of the golgi tendon organ in the body. Because of its signaling capabilities to the spinal cord, it is able to overcome the signaling of the muscles to tell the muscles to contract.  The basic function of the organ is to help  protect the muscles, tendons, and ligaments from injury.  The tendon records the changes in tension, and the rate of change of that tension, and through the spine, conveys that information to the body.  When the tension exceeds a certain threshold, it triggers a lengthening reaction in the muscles.

"Only consummate professional athletes and dancers at the top of their sport or art are believed to actually possess this level of muscular control."
It shows how extensive the training that the athletes/performers go through to get to the level that they are at. They go through such intensive training that the stretch reflex of the muscles has little or even no reflex contraction in response to a sudden stretch. This comes at a high cost though, it provides a high risk of injury if used incorrectly.

This article re-emphasizes what we've been learning about muscles and their roles in the body. It talks about the myosin and actin filaments that work to pull the muscle to its full length. It also discusses the impact that stretching has on the muscles and these filaments, and how stretching can actually be used to realign these filaments, and as a result, help realign misaligned scar tissue. It was also interesting to see how people can actually stretch to their full capacity and bypass natural safeguards to lengthen their muscles to the fullest extent.

Unit 6 Reflection

What is a skeleton's favorite instrument?
A tromBONE!

Besides the puns, in this unit we learned about the skeletal system and its functions in the body. We explored the different bones and their locations in the body, then went deeper and explored the hormones and structure that affect the bones themselves. By completing labs such as the Owl Pellet Dissection Lab where we got to apply what we had learned and try to reconstruct a skeleton from a Barn Owl pellet.

We learned how the bones connected to each other in different ways. One of the things that I was surprised about was that the teeth are actually connected by joints. Immovable joints, but it was interesting to expand what the word joint meant to me, since before I only thought that joints were movable. 

This unit was really interesting to learn about. There were so many dysfunctions in the skeletal system that I was unaware about, like kyphosis and lordosis. It was also really cool to see everything relate back to having good health and keeping a healthy diet, since conditions like osteoporosis can arise from things like smoking and poor diet and exercise.

I would want to learn more about the diseases that can affect the skeletal system, and go into not only the reasons why they are caused but also the ways that people can recover from them, and if there is a recovery plan at all. By applying it more to the real world I think that it would help us remember a lot of the technical details of the systems and really bring the unit together.

I've sort of been failing at my New Year's goals. I promised myself that I would get more sleep, but turns out the amount of sleep I've been getting has dropped. On the other hand, I'm really excited about by 20 Time project of creating a coloring book and I can't wait to get into that in more detail and go through the process of creating something from scratch.