To kick off the 2014-2015 school year in Anatomy and Physiology, my class discussed the Integumentary System, which is your not-so-simple basics: hair, skin, and nails. These are your main protectors against the elements as well as a blockade for foreign material entering your body. Aside from playing many roles in metabolic functions, our skin is our major sensory organ. If you really think about it, you can feel everything from the tiniest bug or smallest hair resting on your arm that is super annoying, to heat, wind, and cold. The reason why we can feel so much is because embedded in our dermis are thousands upon thousands of sensory receptors and nerve endings. To be able to mentally grasp this fact and concept if amazing. All of these thousands of nerves are in just one super thin layer. But that's not all.
This massive organ known as skin is actually split up into three layers which are the Epidermis, the Dermis, and the Hypodermis which is also known as the subcutaneous layer. The subcutaneous layer is extremely important as it is the layer that connects our skin to our underlying organs and muscles. Furthermore, the Epidermis alone contains five individual layers within itself which are, from outermost layer to deepest, stratum corneum, stratum lucidum, stratum granulosome, stratum spinosum, and the stratum basale. Stratum in this case is used solely to describe the idea that these five layers are stacked directly on top of one another. Some layers are specially designed to give a person extra protection such as the stratum lucidum. This layer is what a callous is made of. Basically, this layer is found on the palms of your hands, the soles of your feet, and any other high use area. What happens is over a long period of time of using these specific areas, to protect your skin from other damage, your layers of skin thicken creating a callous.
If you haven't already in life, you will some day stay out in the sun too long and get a gnarly burn, or awkward farmers tan. Well did you know, and this may just blow your mind, but our skin is specially equipped with its own sunscreen? This sunscreen is actually a bunch of cells called melanocytes and act as our natural barrier to harmful UV radiation as well as transforms long exposure to the sun into useable vitamin D. Melanocytes are also what assists in pigmentation, or the tint of your skin. People who live close to the equator generally have a lot more pigmentation, which makes them darker skinned, and visa versa for those who live farther away from the equator. Those people are farther away from the sun and their bodies have adjusted to not synthesizing as many melanocytes which results in their skin being lighter. However, over-synthesized/ overexposed skin to the harmful UV radiation from the sun can result in a breakdown of our melanocytes which results in sun spots or blotches. This can sometimes lead to irreversible scarring or even cancer.
On a separate note, Skin is a major part of the body as it is the skin. However, without the Skeletal system, we basically wouldn't have a body. The integumentary system works hand in hand with the skeletal system to protect our bodies and provide us with structural support. When one system is off kilter, it usually results in the other one failing of performing baldy as well. There are several disorders that deal with this. Cleft or hair lip is one where the bone and cartilage in the palate of your mouth doesn't connect properly which results in the skin that would normally form around your mouth to be disconnected. Another bone issue that can affect our skin is Scoliosis. This condition is when your spine doesn't form correctly in a straight line and curves into an "s" or "c" shape. The spine is what helps out\r body distribute the overall pressure evenly, but when the spine is unaligned, it can lead to targeted pressure points which can, over a long period of time, result in wear sores, or more commonly known as bed sores.
Scoliosis Cleft Lip/ Palate
This massive organ known as skin is actually split up into three layers which are the Epidermis, the Dermis, and the Hypodermis which is also known as the subcutaneous layer. The subcutaneous layer is extremely important as it is the layer that connects our skin to our underlying organs and muscles. Furthermore, the Epidermis alone contains five individual layers within itself which are, from outermost layer to deepest, stratum corneum, stratum lucidum, stratum granulosome, stratum spinosum, and the stratum basale. Stratum in this case is used solely to describe the idea that these five layers are stacked directly on top of one another. Some layers are specially designed to give a person extra protection such as the stratum lucidum. This layer is what a callous is made of. Basically, this layer is found on the palms of your hands, the soles of your feet, and any other high use area. What happens is over a long period of time of using these specific areas, to protect your skin from other damage, your layers of skin thicken creating a callous.
If you haven't already in life, you will some day stay out in the sun too long and get a gnarly burn, or awkward farmers tan. Well did you know, and this may just blow your mind, but our skin is specially equipped with its own sunscreen? This sunscreen is actually a bunch of cells called melanocytes and act as our natural barrier to harmful UV radiation as well as transforms long exposure to the sun into useable vitamin D. Melanocytes are also what assists in pigmentation, or the tint of your skin. People who live close to the equator generally have a lot more pigmentation, which makes them darker skinned, and visa versa for those who live farther away from the equator. Those people are farther away from the sun and their bodies have adjusted to not synthesizing as many melanocytes which results in their skin being lighter. However, over-synthesized/ overexposed skin to the harmful UV radiation from the sun can result in a breakdown of our melanocytes which results in sun spots or blotches. This can sometimes lead to irreversible scarring or even cancer.
On a separate note, Skin is a major part of the body as it is the skin. However, without the Skeletal system, we basically wouldn't have a body. The integumentary system works hand in hand with the skeletal system to protect our bodies and provide us with structural support. When one system is off kilter, it usually results in the other one failing of performing baldy as well. There are several disorders that deal with this. Cleft or hair lip is one where the bone and cartilage in the palate of your mouth doesn't connect properly which results in the skin that would normally form around your mouth to be disconnected. Another bone issue that can affect our skin is Scoliosis. This condition is when your spine doesn't form correctly in a straight line and curves into an "s" or "c" shape. The spine is what helps out\r body distribute the overall pressure evenly, but when the spine is unaligned, it can lead to targeted pressure points which can, over a long period of time, result in wear sores, or more commonly known as bed sores.
Scoliosis Cleft Lip/ Palate