In this lab we tested our different reflexes and how fast they are and how they function when fatigued. We recorded our data and than we put it in a class average. Our reflexes help us respond instantaneously and super fast.

Our photopupillary reflex is when the pupil adjust to light. Humans adapted to this so when it is dark out we do not just go blind, we can actually see. Our eyes adapt which is good for survival and is a good key to living. Some may say that it is survival of the fittest, who ever can adapt will be successful.

The knee jerk reflex of the Patellar reflex is when we get a tap on the knee at the doctors. I used to love this one as a kid but i never knew what it was. When the hammer hits your knee in the right spot it should shoot up. It is called the monosynaptic reflex because of the one synapse in the curcuit that helps kick out the leg. When I did 30 squats the muscles were fatigued which caused the reaction to die down because of a lack of ATP flowing through my body. The humans blink reflex is shown when something is a possible threat to the eye. Before doing it I thought that it wud be easy not to blink, but when it was happening it was a natural reflex to blink to protect my eyes. I would say the only time I dont blink when something is thrown at my face is if it is a football. We have this reflex to protect our eyes from intruders that could harm us. We than tested our plantar reflex. The reaction to this test was that the foot would move inward and tense up. Someone with multiple scerosis would most likley show babinski's sign because the nerves would be damaged and not functioning properly. WE than tested how fast we really are by dropping a ruler and testing where we caught it. I have been awake for a while and worked out this morning so my reaction time was pretty fast. Others who may have just woke up had slower time. This showed that the signal that told my brain from my hand to grab the ruler was faster than other peoples. When I did this while I was texting my reaction time slowed down because my brain had to take its time off of texting and onto the next task that was grabbing the ruler. 

The brain

Cerebral Cortex

1)What do the frontal lobes do?

Controls your personality, as well as helps individuals with problem solving, memory, language, judgment and impulse control.

2)What is the relationship between selective attention and learning?

They are the ability to pick up on and focus on the most important facts or details.

3)What is the last part of your brain to develop and what can you do to prevent it from deteriorating?

The last part to develop is the frontal lobe and to prevent it from deteriorating is by keeping it active.

4)What does the neocortex do?

Helps guide through your body. Controls your senses,spatial awareness and motor skills.

5)What is the role of the prefrontal cortex?

This controls your personality and how you act in social situations.

6)What do we know about the prefrontal cortex’s relationship with multitasking?

Multitasking is not really a thing it is just the prefrontal cortex helps the brain jump between tasks quickly

7)Which part of the brain is associated with speech and language development?  Give an interesting fact about this region.

The broca's area is responsible for speech and language development. It is associated with language.

8)Which part of your brain is responsible for thinking the following: “Is it hot in here or is it just me?”

Somatosensory cortex

9)What does your visual cortex do for you?

Distinguish colors and more complex images such as faces.

10)State three interesting or significant facts about your occipital lobe.

It is your  brain’s visual processing center. It is the part that deals with imagination. Damage can result in blindness or a loss of image.

11)What would happen if your temporal lobes were damaged?

Impaired memory, and speaking impairment.

12)What is your “fast brain” and what does it do?

It is the region that picks up information in a matter of milliseconds and it controls the eye movement.

Neuron

13)State 3 things that you could do that would influence your synapses, and have a positive effect on your life and health.

Exercise , a healthy diet and taking omega acids may affect synapses.

14)What is the relationship between multisensory or multi-modal learning and your dendrites?

They are different between memorizing something and learning it.

15)How does “big picture thinking” and mnemonics affect dendrites and/or learning?

The big picture is said to be needed to fully comprehended a subject which uses dendrites.

16)Describe a neurotransmitter that you feel is very important.  Justify your reasoning.

Limbic System

17)What does the corpus callosum do?

Allows communication between the two hemispheres of the brain. It transmits neural messages between the left and right of the brain.

18)What is the relationship between music and the corpus callosum?

Musicians corpus callosum is generally bigger than nonmusicians. It is clear in the anterior and posterior parts of the corpus callosum. Music increases the plasticity at certain ages of development which is why it is so good for a young child to learn and play music. Bigger corpus callosum means an  increase in coordination  and differences in white matter structure.

19)Why is the thalamus important?

It is responsible for motor control and regulates your consciousness.

Relate and Review

The website we looked at had a 3d picture of the brain and its neurons where we could click on and find the pysiology of different parts. There were many new things that I learned about the brain that was very interesting.This webssite was extremely helpful and very interesting. I even did a little extra looking at it because i was so intrigues. It was a good tool and I may go back to it to study if I need some extra studying about the brain and its functions.

Brain dissection lab

  this is the cross section of the cerebrum








              

This is the picture and labeling of the sagital cut of the brain.

Cerebrum is yellow, brain stem is red, cerebellum is green.







In this lab we labeled and made incisions on the sheep brain. There was only two cuts we had to make. one was a sagittal cut and than a cross section cut on the cerebrum. we labeled many parts of the brain starting with discovering the anterior and posterior side of it. After that we got the cerebrum and the cerebellum which is the bottom part that is shaped like a bell. The brain stem was really fragile. Once we made the sagital cut labeling got a little more difficult, we labeled the thalamus, optic nerve, medulla oblongata, pons, mid brain, corpus callosum and hypothalamus. Than we had to make a cross section on the cerebrum to make the white and gray matter more distinct.

Brain stem	The Brain stem connects neurons to the brain and is assosiated with many involuntary movements in the brain.
Cerebellum	coordinates voluntary movements and receieves sensory info from the sensory receptors.
Cerebrum	This is related to the thughts and the action of the body, the voluntary movements.

Thalamus	Relay sensory and motar signals, regulate consisness alertness and sleep.
Optic nerve	transmits information from the retina of the eye to the brain
Medulla oblongata	Controls body functions, coordination of body movements.
pons	Relay info from the cerebrum to the cerebellum
midbrain	midbrain
Corpus callosum	Helps share information
hypothalamus	Maintain homeostasis

The function of the myelin is to wrap around axons and helps the impulse flow through.

Eye dissection

The Cornea refracts light. The sclera provides structure and protection of the eye. The optic nerve transmits the signals generated from the eye to the brain.The pupil helps regulate the amount of light passing through to the retina, which is at the back of the eye. Light is transmitted through the vitreous humor. The fatty tissue around the eye supports the eye.External eye muscle allows the eye to move around easier. The choroid absorbs light and prevents internal reflection. The lens refracts the light you see.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBeg1rgzgqA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chu1YAbMWCE

The Clay Brain

We used clay to make a diagram of the brain. We involved many different parts of the brain . We split the brain into the right hemisphere and the left sagittal side of the brain. We had to use a key to explain the different parts. 

Hole in the head

         A woman was born without a cerebellum, She couldn't walk straight her whole life and couldn't talk until she was 7. They did not find out that the cerebellum was missing until she was 24. The space where the cerebellum should be was empty. The cerebellum is very important because it works the motor control and balance. Problems in the cerebellum can lead to severe mental impairment, movement disorders, epilepsy or a potentially fatal build up of fluid in the brain. Only 9 people have ever lived without a cerebellum.


Corpus Collosum

It connects the right and left cerebral hemispheres. It is the largest white matter structure in the brain. People who are missing it can have either mild or very severe futures. Te condition is called agenesis. The surgical operation called corpus callosotomy is used as a last resort to treat epilepsy. This causes the split brain syndrome. The left hemisphere of the brain controls the right side of the body, and the right hemisphere of the brain controls the left side of the body. It is also important to realize that the left side of the brain is dominant in understanding language. The right side is more dominant in creativity, Without the corpus collosum there would be no split brain. 

Teenagers Take risk's

Primal Teen by Barbara Strauch
Risky Business: Why they do the things they do

This chapter interviewed teenage kids and ask them why they do the stupid things that they do. Many of their answers were just "because it is fun" or "because I wanted to try something new". It says that the risky behavior is normal and even necessary for teens. Parents all think that risk are all one bad thing but they are wrong. Many child Psychologist say that teens need to do some risky business because they need to find out who they are and where they fit in. The level of risk taking is different for every kid and parents need to realize that. This passage also talks about how dopamine works in the brain. It works in the pleasure circuit, when it gets activated we get a good feeling in us. Too much dopamine is possible as well. when Dopamine is over done people get something called a massive bomb attack. Volkow says, "I believe that novelty, risk taking, activates dopamine in humans, no question. That's also the system nature has of telling the organism to pay attention to the new thing, figure out if it is positive or negative. And teenagers, after all, have many more new things to figure out."  Risk taking is not a bad or good thing, it is part of a teenagers life growing up and maturing and can help develop who they become as a person.

Is there a scientific explanation for why , if kids get in trouble for their first risk, why do they keep doing it?

Is it possible to be born with naturally higher levels of dopamine or lower levels of dopamine?

Unit 7 reflection

Going into this unit I really did not have a good understanding of how muscles work and how much they actually do for us. A main topic we learned about was Muscle contractions. We did a stop motion video on this which we drew out the 12 steps involved in muscle contractions. Here is the link to the video. Muscle contraction video . Muscle contraction was a little difficult for me. Mainly just the memorization of all the steps because it is a long proccess. Muscle relaxation has to be a part of this lecture as well. It is a 4 step process and is much simpler. The Impulses pass, the Ca2+ gate closes, than Ca2+ is transported back into sacroplasmic reticulum and than the muscle finally relaxes. Here is a picture to go along with the repeated steps of muscle contractions.

We also learned about muscle twitch. There are three types of muscle twitches which have different features and roles. Slow twitch fibers contract relatively slow and are dependent of oxygen. They have high amounts of myoglobin, mitochondria, and capillaries. They have low amounts of glycogen stored. They are slow to fatigue and are usually red because of all the oxygen they get. Fast twitch(a) Fibers have a high contractile speed, and do not fatigue as easy. They have a high blood flow capacity because they are moving so fast and are white/pale color. Fast twitch (b) Fibers have low blood flow capacity, fast contractile speed and fatigue fast.

The muscular system involves movement, muscle tissue and connective tissue. The functions of muscles involve the movement of bone of fluid, maintain posture and body position, stabalize joints and heat generations. Along with this topic to get a better understanding we did a chicken dissection lab. It was probably one of the most hands on lab we have had all year and was quite interesting. We had to make difficult insitions and mark up the chicken with the parts of its body. That was the most difficult part of the lab. It was a set back as well for us because we had to go back after it was all done and label the parts via phone and label the parts because we initially forgot to do it on the chicken. Here is a link that has pictures and a better understanding of the parts of the chicken. Chicken dissection lab .

The lecture that was most interesting to me was the performance enhancement topic. The reason I found it so interesting is because I am playing sports year round and have seen and know people who take enhancement drugs. I have even been asked myself to take them and am glad I refused. We did a little assignment on google slides where we got to pick a enhancer and list its risk and talk about it. I chose creatine because it is the most common one that I see especially in highschoolers trying to get big and gain muscle and dont know what they are actually doing to their body.

Finally, My year goals are at a peak right now. I have 88 percent in this class and am working really hard to bring it up to an A. I am struggling in math class though and it is bringing my grade down. My goal for math is to have a solid C+ by the end of the year. Sports wise things are going very well. I was just accepted into my travel 7on7 team where we play in many tournaments and are top competetors. We won our first tournament, it was a very long day, we were there from 8 am all the way to 9 pm. I am really excited moving forward and hope to do big things.

-Kian G

Performance enhancement drugs can have a very negative long lasting effect. A performance enhancer is a manufactured product for oral ingestion, intransal application, or inhalation containing compounds that contain a stimulant. They tend to boost athletic performance and build muscle. The risk of it are low sperm count, impotence, enlarged prostate, damaged liver and kidney.

Chicken dissection Analysis

In this lab we had a headless chicken and had to make cuts and insersions. We were given a raw foster farms chicken and had to identify muscles and tendons. The movement occured at the joints. One end was connected to a tendon which attach our muscles to bones. We had clear views of the flexor carpi, ulnaris, and the brachioradalis. These play big roles in the wings. The chicken had massive back muscles. We learned what causes the shin splints and saw it in our chicken The difference is that there is no movement at the origin and at the insersion there is movement because of the contractions. In the chicken the Gastrocenemius is the same as our calf muscle in many ways. It gives the same function and location. ONly thing is that the one in humans is much larger due to proportion. Humans have a rectus femoris which is similar to the chickens  quadreceps femoris. It is flexible and gives a stable walking function. The only difference is the way the muscle bends and contrasts. Another similarity is that chickens and humans both have a very similar deltoid. This is the shoulder bone.

  

                        
         Pectoralis Major:Pull the wing vertically, powering the flight
Pectoralis minor:Long tendon and is distal end runs through shoulder joint  and attaches the dorsal side of humerous
Trapezius: Perpendicular from the backbone to the shoulder of the bird and pull shoulder back
Latissimus Dorsi:Directly distal to the trapezius on the birds and humans back.
Deltiod: Muscle on the center top of the shoulder of both the bird and the human.
Biceps brachii: Cranial side of the upper wing or arm in birds and humans.
Triceps humeralis: Inferior side of the upper wing or or arm. Extends the wing.

Flexor carpi ulnaris: Runs from the back of the elbow to the side of the hand away from the thumb. Flexes the hand.
Brachioradialis: Largest muscle on the superior side closest to alula. Pulls back the hand.
Sartorius: Runs down the front edge of the thigh from the ilium to the knee in birds.
Iliotibialis: Covers the whole lateral side of the thigh in birds. Extends thigh and flexes leg.
Bicep femoris: Medial to the inferior section. It flexes the leg and is used for leg curls in humans.
Semimembranosus: Just inferior and medial to the biceps femoris and defines the caudal edge of the thigh in the bird.
Semitendinosus: It extends the thigh.
Quadreceps femoris: Lies on the inside of the thigh just medial to the sartorius in the bird. Flexes the thigh and extends the lower thigh.
Gastrocnemius: Primary muscle of the dorsal and medial sides of the drumstick. Extends the foot and flexes lower leg.
Peroneus longus: Primary superficial muscle on the lateral side of the drumstick in birds. Extends the foot.
Tibialis anterior: Larger than and directly under the peroneus longus in birds . It is smaller and runs up the lateral side of the lower leg in humans.

What Happens when you Stretch

"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"

I Chose this quote because I am always stretching after sports and before but woudnt hold it for a long time. Now I know that holding it for a long time helps the muscles actually relax and feel better.


"When you perform a sit-up, one would normally assume that the stomach muscles inhibit the contraction of the muscles in the lumbar, or lower, region of the back. In this particular instance however, the back muscles (spinal erectors) also contract. This is one reason why sit-ups are good for strengthening the back as well as the stomach."

This is interesting because I always want to work my back as well as my stomach and I do a lot of sit ups. This told me that now I am working on my back as well because of the spinal erectors contracting as well.

"Some sources suggest that with extensive training, the stretch reflex of certain muscles can be controlled so that there is little or no reflex contraction in response to a sudden stretch."

This is Interesting except that they said its only for extreme performers. It said that it could actually cause injury if used improperly.

Relate and Review:This reading was about what happens when the muscle is getting stretched. Stretching starts with a sacromere which is a basic unit of contractin and ends with lengthened fibers.Proprioceptors are the nerve endings that relay all the info about the muscularskeletal system to the nervous system. When muscles contract they produce tension at the point where muscles is connected to the tendon, where the golgi tendon organ is located.Reciprocal inhibiyion is when an agonist contracts in order to cause the desired notion. It usually forces it to relax. Overall this reading was about the contraction and relaxation and how stretching effects the body.

This unit was mainly about bones, and where they are and how they work and what they do. During this unit we did a few labs, one of which we went from station to station learning the placement of bones and some of there functions and weather they are flat, long or short. My favorite lab was the owl pellet lab where we went through an owls throw up and picked out little bones and placed them in shape to make it into the rodent or bird that the owl ate. The bones were not broken because the owl does not chew its food it just swallows it. Main topics we learned about was the skeletal system, learning that it consist of joints, bones, cartilage, and ligaments. Along with the types of bone cells, Osteocytes which are mature bone cells, bone cells forming which are osteoblast and osteoclast which are bone destroying cells.  Sthe bone types are long bones, short bones, flat bones and irregular bones. Another big topic was disorders of the skeletal system which was mainly spine problems such as scoliosis: abnormal curvature of spine, Kyphosis: spine looks normal but you may develop a hump. Lordosis:Excess curvature of lumbar spine.  My goals in this class are going well, my goal was to maintain a B average or higher and I have about a 86% right now. And for my goal to work really hard in football, that is going really well for me because I just got accepted to play for a travel 7 on 7 team with some of the best players in the bay area.

Owl pellet lab

In this lab we had owl pellets (owl throw up) and disected through them. We picked out the fur, and the bones separately. We had to be very careful because the little bones were fragile. Once we picked the bones out we had to identify what kind of animal it was depending on its bone types. Ours was a rodent not a bird. It was a pocket gopher. We knew because of the tail bone and the skull and teeth. The skull length was between 30-42 mm. The evidence from the packet and our picture shows us that the fact we had a pocket gopher holds true. The human skeleton and the pocket gopher skeleton are similar because they both have a skull. The ribs are similar because of the last two being floating ribs. Humans and rodents also share the Femur, which is the big thigh leg bone. There were also differences in bones,such as the phalanges on the pocket ghoper had claws unlike human phalanges. The rodents have the two front teeth which are sharp for cathing prey called incisors. The rodent also has a much longer tail bone than the one bone involved in the human.

unit 5 refelction

There was lots of things that I learned in this unit. Starting with the digestive system.  there is 6 basic functions to the digestive system. Ingestion, which involves the take in of food by the mouth, than secretion the oozing out of water , acid, or enzymes. Mixing propulsion which is the contractions and relaxations of muscles. than Digestion where the breaking down of the food into small peices happen. Absorbtion is the taking in needed nutrients and defecation. The order food goes down is the mouth to the pharynx, esophagus, stomach , small intestine, (duodenum, jejunum, ileum),  and finaly the large intestine which passes through the cecum, appendix, ascending, transverse, decending, sigmoid colon, rectum than anus. We than learned about the different stages that food has energy extractions from. In stage 1 the large molecules are broken down into smaller ones. Stage 2 is the small molecules are turned into Acetly CoA. Stage 3 is when the food takes common pathways in oxidation of fuel molecules like ETC and the krebs cycle. There is also 3 different states. The fed state is also known ad the absoptive state and occurs difectlt after the meal. The pancreas releases insulin. The fasting state or the post absorptive state is whithin 1 hour of the meal and the insulin levels drops and glucagon rises. Glycogen is converted to glucose in the liver. Gluconeogenesis occurs in this stage and the next stage and it is remember as New Glucose Made.The starvation state is when the muscles rely solely on adipose tissue and the brai uses ketone bodies. Diabetes was an interesting topic for me. I learned about GLUT-4 transporters which are insulin dependent. Exercise increases the production of GLUT-4 because glucose transported into muscle and fat cells are by this. In the endocrine system steroid hormones are lipid soluble unlike non steriod hormones. The pituitary lobe is controlled by the hypothalamus, the posterior lobe is responsible for fluid retentionand contraction of the uterus. The pancreas includes insulin which reduces blood glucose and glucagon increases blood glucose. The kidneys regulate red blood cell production. The Thymus is above the heart and lots of T cells develop here. The tonsils are an aggregation of lymphatic tissue at the ring of the throat. THere are lymph nodes which are bean shaped and it filters the lymph by trapping foreign substances, then destroyed by immune cells. T Cells involve Cellular immunity. B cells involve humoral and nk cells are a nonspecific responce.

There was lots of activities that we did. One being the Zebra notes was interesting and the recent homework we had of us searching for something our self. http://kianscoolblogs.blogspot.com/2016/01/diabetes-type-2.html

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Diabetes (type 2)

http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/type-2/facts-about-type-2.html

I wanted to learn more about diabetes. Mainly type 2, the most common type. Your body does not take insulin properly as we learned in our fuel metabolism unit of diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is treated with a change of lifestyle, oral medications and insulin injections. Type 2 diabetes causes peoples cells to be starved for energy and if not treatd correctly overtime it can effect your eyes, kidneys, nerves, or heart. Another thing i learned from this source is that type 2 diabetes tends to get worse over time. You may not need medications now but later on as you get older you may need it. A Very interesting fact I also read is that type 2 diabetes is more commonly found in African americans, latinos, Native Americans, asian americans and the aged population.

This reading seems credible to me, it has solid information that I have heard before and the page was written by a doctor. The only thing that stood out to me that did not feel right to me was that different races are more immune to it. I believe it to be more of a genetic thing and a way of lifestyle. I feel that if you stay true to the 5 pillars of health it should lower the risk of getting type 2 diabetes.