Fun facts about the human body

The human body is an extraordinary machine. Without you knowing it or being aware of it, your body is perpetually doing things. That is why there are a thousand and one fun facts about the human body and researches are constantly discovering new fun, interesting and hilarious facts.

For example, what effect does love have on people or what does smoking do to the body. Read on for a whole series of fun, interesting, funny and strange facts about the human body. Let's start with 10 fun facts about the human body before we look at fun facts about the human experience.

1. We have waterbrains

There are countless interesting facts about the human body, for example about the brain. 80 percent of your brain consists of water. This may seem high, but on average the entire human body consists of approximately 70 percent water. And adult human brain weighs on average around 1300 grams. But weight and size say nothing about intelligence or cleverness.

2. We can have Superman-like powers

When your body feels threatened or is in a dangerous situation, it is stressed. At such a moment, adrenaline is released. This adrenaline can make you run very fast or think clearer about how to react to a situation.

Oxygen is the petrol of the human body. A human being cannot exist without oxygen. Oxygen is pumped through the body via our circulatory system. If you add up the length of all the blood vessels in a human body, you arrive at a total length of about 100,000 kilometres!

3. Our sneezes can get a speeding ticket

Sneezing is a natural reflex of the body and is caused by an irritation of the nasal mucosa. The sneeze is actually an explosive contraction of the sneezing muscles. When you sneeze, the air can reach a speed of up to 165 kilometres per hour!

Sneezing can be caused by a tickling substance in your nose or by hypersensitivity to certain substances. If you have hay fever, you can often tell when it is springtime again. People with hay fever are allergic to certain substances which float in the air at that time of year and irritate their nasal mucous membranes.

4. Our heart is always working out

Your heart pumps around 115,000 times a day, pumping between 8,000 and 9,000 litres of blood through your body. That's about 6 litres per minute. Your heart beat is actually the sound of the opening and closing of the heart valves. This important muscle is about the size of a fist in an adult and weighs less than 500 grams.

5. We exchange bacteria when we kiss

There are more bacteria in your mouth than there are people living on Earth. That means that there are more than 7 billion bacteria in your mouth. Of all these bacteria, about 250 are exchanged during when you French kiss, and another 10,000 parasites are exchanged as well.

6. The human skeleton keeps growing

Did you know that your skeleton keeps growing until you are approximately 35 years old? Until then your body produces more bone tissue than it breaks down. Although your bones do not get longer after puberty, they do get thicker.

7. We get a new jacket every few weeks

Did you know that your whole body renews itself constantly? Well, at least the cells that make up your body do. There are about 50 to 75 trillion cells in the human body and each type of cell has its own life span or regeneration cycle.

Red blood cells, for example, live for about four months, while white blood cells live for more than a year on average. Your skin cells live about two or three weeks, meaning that your body has a new jacket every few weeks.

8. We are active sleepers

Did you know that when you sleep, your brain is much more active than when you are awake? Your brain processes a lot of information and recovers from the days’ activities. It is as if your brain is rebooting a little every time you sleep.

9. Women blink more often than men.

A 2008 study showed that when it comes to spontaneous blinking, the type we do without thinking about it and without an external cause, women blink 19 times per minute and men 11 times. Of course this is on average. The difference als exists with reflex blinking, such as blinking caused by bright lights or loud noises.

10. Baby bodies are even more special

When a baby is born it hasn’t developed completely. The larynx, for instance, has not yet developed properly, which allows babies up to 6 months old to breathe and swallow at the same time. And because babies are born without kneecaps, they can easily put their feet in their mouths. The cartilage that is there, later develops into the kneecap.

Human Oddities

Did you know that the number of bones an adult has is less than the number of bones a baby has? A baby is born with 350 bones. Over time, some bones grow together so that the body of an adult consists of approximately 206 bones.

Smoking is unhealthy, but research shows that a lack of love can be even more harmful. Social isolation can cause heart disease. In addition, it was found that isolated people with heart disease are twice as likely to die from it than people with support from their environment.

You may have heard this weird fact before, but we can't keep it to ourselves. The salivary glands in your mouth produce over a litre of saliva a day. The average volume of a bathtub is 114 litres. That means that an adult drools more than three bathtubs every year!

FUN FACTS ABOUT LOVE

When you are in love, hormones are rushing through your body, you feel euphoric, happy(er) and you are constantly preoccupied with that person. But what other effects does it have? For one, when you are in pain and you look at the person you are in love with, the reward areas in the brain are activated and you experience less pain.

This was shown in a study on the experience of pain. The participants were exposed to pain and given various tasks. First, they had to connect words, then they had to look at photos of attractive people and then at photos of their partners. What happened? The last task caused them the least pain.

Looking for an idea for an original date? Go skydiving, white-water rafting or some other exciting adventure together. After all, excitement leads to feelings of love! Research shows that we attribute the nervousness of exciting situations to our feelings for the other person, rather than to the exciting situation itself. This is how our infatuation is rekindled.

There are countless websites that want to 'get you started' with opening lines. We didn’t really need the research to proof it to us, but research does show that "Do you have a map? I keep getting lost in your eyes" or "If you were a hamburger, I'd call you Mac Beauty" are not the way to a woman's heart. So, learn from these fun facts. It is time for a different approach.

The last of the fun facts about love is a little obvious, but true. The perfect partner does not exist. Some people go from relationship to relationship, looking for that one perfect person who meets all their requirements, but end up staying alone. The perfect partner is something you create when you are in love. A side effect of falling in love is that you experience someone's negative qualities as positive. In your eyes, this person can do little wrong, even though reality might be different. Therefore, you will only find your perfect partner if you dare to open yourself up to love.

FUNNY FACTS ABOUT LAUGHTER

You have probably heard it before: laughing is healthy. We have gathered some funny facts about laughter for you, which will clarify this point!

The first fun fact about laughing is about the number of muscles used during laughter. Laughing is a workout: when you laugh, you use muscles in your face, diaphragm and abdomen. In the face alone, 15 muscles are used when you laugh. In addition, your brain produces the substance endorphin when you laugh. Endorphins can make you feel less pain, but also make you feel more relaxed.

Did you know that you cannot tickle yourself? When you tickle someone, the nerves are stimulated. The stimulation of the nerves triggers a reflex in the brain. When you try to tickle yourself, your brain predicts the tickle and hardly reacts to it. When someone else tickles you, your brain is not able to predict the stimuli. Therefore, you cannot tickle yourself, but you can tickle others.

Have you acquired a taste for fun facts about the human body and would you like to learn even more extraordinary things? Then come to BODY WORLDS: The Happiness Project!