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-------------------- 2521 - CELLS - You Are As Young As You Feel?
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- Hard to believe, but, every molecule in your body has been replaced at least 9 years ago. None of your parts at the molecular level are more than 9 years old. The cells in your body are constantly replacing themselves.
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- All the cells on the surface area of your skin are already dead. You have probably 5 pounds of dead skin that your are carrying around. But, don’t try to shed it just to loose weight. It sheds itself in the form of that gray dust you see on your coffee table. That dust is largely old skin. The same as that gray stuff on the inside of your vacuum cleaner.
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- Most living cells in our body live an average of one month. Liver cells survive for years although the parts inside the cells are renewed every few days. You get 100,000,000,000 brain cells at birth. And, that is all you get. And, you are loosing 500 brain cells an hour your whole life. I better hurry up and finish this review. I do not have many brain cells left. 79*365*24*500 = 346,620,000 brain cells are already gone.
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- The cell membrane, in effect the skin of the cell, is really only a fatty material called a “lipid“. It is about the consistency of a light grade motor oil. Remember ,we are talking about the nanometer scale and things are different with things are this small. Liquid water becomes a heavy-duty gel. Lipids are like an iron shell.
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- If you could blow up a human cell so that atoms were the size of peas the entire cell would be a half mile across. Inside the cell would be like meteor storm with basketball-size and car-size objects flying around constantly in all directions.
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- An atom is 10^-10 meters across. A pea is 10^-2 meters across. So, everything is magnified by 10^8 times, or 100,000,000 larger on this scale.
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- Each strand of your cell’s DNA gets damaged every 8.4 seconds, on average. That works out to be 10,000 times per day that your cell’s DNA has to repair itself, or it dies.
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- Remember, the cell, or the parts of the cell, only live for about a month on average. Some protein molecules only live for 30 minutes before they die. Other protein molecules will live for several weeks.
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- What powers all this activity in a living cell? Every cell is full of electricity, about 0.1 volts across a nanometer. A human cell is 10^-5 meters across, that is 10,000 nanometers across. 0.1 volts is not much electricity. You certainly do not feel it.
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- But, if you scaled it up to a meter it would be equivalent to a thunderstorm lightning bolt of 20,000,000 volts per meter. The cell’s battery packs that carry this electricity will be explained later:
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- Inside the human cell is a dynamic activity that is happening at speeds you can not imagine. It is all controlled by communications between different types of molecules: Inside each cell there are millions of these objects:
------------------- lysosmes
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------------------- endosomes
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------------------- ribosomes
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------------------- ligands
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------------------- peroxsomes
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------------------- proteins, 20,000 different types
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------------------ each protein with 50,000 molecules.
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- To stay alive each cell in your body must receive its own blood supply Small blood capillaries reach every living cell. To get the blood through this vast network of vessels the heart must pump 75 gallons of blood every hour.
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- That is 1,800 gallons of blood moving inside your body every day. That is the size of a small swimming pool. And, this activity only applies when you are resting. Start vigorous exercise and all this increases up to 6 fold.
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- Each cell collects oxygen from the blood using mitochondria. The origin of mitochondria is likely captured bacteria that have learned to live inside a cell. The cell gets the benefit because the mitochondria convert oxygen energy into adenosine triphosphate which are the battery packs that power the cell.
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- Every 2 minutes the adenosine triphosphate battery packs dump all their electricity and go dead. They are replace by 1,000,000,000 of them coming on line and this happens every 2 minutes. If you skin feels warm that is adenosine triphosphate your cells are producing that is equal to half your body weight.
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- Every day 1,000,000,000’s of cells die and the other cells clean up the mess. If a cell does not die when it is supposed to, but, instead, starts to grow and divide, that is cancer.
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- Hormones are the communication carriers that tell cells what to do. Hormones include:
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------------------- insulin
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------------------ adrenaline
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------------------ estrogen
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------------------- testosterone
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- Brain cells communicate through the nerve cells. Cells also have the capability to communicate with each other. Neighbors cooperate to work on a coordinated effort.
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- Somehow all this results in a walking, talking, thinking you. Atomic engineering at its finest. The common ingredient appears to be a focused quest for survival.
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- Sorry, I need to end this Review. I have already burned up to many brain cells. And, by last count I do not have many more left. Only, 99,653,380,000 brain cells left to work with.
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- December 3, 2019 2521 1299
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--------------------- Tuesday, December 3, 2019 --------------------
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