Owl Pellet Lab

Owl Pellet Lab

In the lab, we look the pellet and measured it. Ours was 4.33 grams, 1.5 inches in length and 1.3 inches in width. Next, we separated the fur and dirt from the bones and put them into separate piles. Once we had the bones, we used the instructions on page 15 to determine the organism that the skeleton was of.
Our organism was the Vole. We determined this organism by referring to the steps on page 15 of the work book. The answer to the first step was that our organism had teeth and the second concluded that there were different sections for the canine and molar teeth. That sent us to step 3 where the organism had individual roots for the teeth.
The concluding factor was between the vole and the pocket gopher. Since the skulls length was 25 mm and width 14 mm with lower jaw being 12 mm and width 3 mm, the vole was in that category. Having teeth separated the organism from a bird and the rest such as the teeth roots and molar separation, along with the size of the skull which separated the vole from all other rodents but especially the pocket gopher. The pocket gophers skull was ranging from 30-42 mm length and 25-36 mm width. The last fact that determined the vole was the organism was that the front teeth were pointed as shown in the picture below. That is how we determined that the vole was the prey of the owl.

The voles skeleton is similar to the humans in which they have teeth, different sections for the different kinds of teeth; molars and canines. Also, the vole and humans have the same joint near the temple of the skull that
is the second class lever which allows the diagstric muscle to open the mouth.

Key differences include the size of the skull because the length of the vole is 25 mm and the humans is much larger. Also, the vole has an upper and bottom tooth and the the molars are far back in the jaw where as humans have teeth all across the from and the sides and the mole has a larger mandible.  Lastly, the vole has very small occipital, parietal, and temporal skulls on the sides or the back of the head because their skull is longer, but humans have distinct areas for those skulls because they have a larger rounded cavity for that bone.

CREDIT: Joshua Li has the pictures.

Unit 6 Reflection

Unit 6 Reflection

Unit 6 was al about the brain and how it uses the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system to be able to carry out daily functions. we began with the basic brain anatomy and physiology and how the brain is separated by the corpus callosum into the 2 hemispheres which are contralateral, meaning anything that is received by the right side goes through the left side of the brain and the left side of the brain controls the right side. Movement is controlled by the cerebellum and if the cerebellum or any part of the brain were missing, other parts of the brain would take the responsibility. Movement is a part of the somatic system because the brain can regulate it and make choices, the prefrontal cortex, whereas other parts such as the heart and smooth tissue are from the autonomic side. The brain structure was shown during the brain dissection. During the eye dissection,  we learned about the structure of the eye and how the parts work together to send messages to the brain through the optic nerve. 

Though the brain is so high tech, there are diseases that go along with it. Meningitis is the inflammation of the meninges, Encephalitic is the inflammation of the brain, epilepsy causes seizures, cerebral palsy is when there is a problem in development, ALS which is the degeneration of neurons, Perkinsons disease which is the degeneration of motor neurons, multiple sclerosis which is the degeneration of myelin, Alzheimer's which is the degeneration of the brain. But those are only CNS diseases. PNS diseases include sciatica which is a damaged nerve that sends sharp pain through the leg and lower back, Neuralgia which is pain due to damaged neurons, trigeminal neuralgia which is in the face, bells palsy which is the paralyse of a side of the face, and carpal tunnel syndrome which is the numbness due to a pinched nerve. 

In a woman perpetually falling, her cerebellum was missing so she had no sense of balance or touch of her surroundings and movement. This puts pressure on the other parts of the brain to take over the job of that missing piece. 

Some advantages were that my 20-time project helped me understand the brain better and the different parts, especially how drugs influence it but a setback would be learning all the different diseases and how they hurt the brain and what effects they would have on the body. 

What I want to learn more about is whether or not CRISPR would be able to use undifferentiated cells to replicate that of a functioning part of the brain and surgically incorporate it into the person's brain who was originally missing that specific part. 

As for my new years' goal, this semester has not been hard to stay away from senioritis but all of the preparation and visits for college has made focusing on classes much more difficult. What I am doing to help myself do better in the classes is to find interest in everything I am learning and even if I am not the most thrilled about the topic I will be willing to put in all effort. 

Reflex Lab

Reflex Lab 

A reflex is an action taken as a response to a stimulus without conscious thought. The reflex goes through the spine in the spine arc rather than the brain because it is quicker. In this lab we looked at all the different reflexes; the somatic reflex, the autonomic reflexes, knee-jerk reflex, but not the withdraw reflex because that includes touching something hot or sharp. 

The process goes from the sensory neuron to the spinal chord to the finger to the withdraw to the second impulse then to the brain and then is aware. 

lab analysis: 

1. humans have evolved the reflex of shrinking the pupil because this way the eye is capable of adapting to the amount of light going through the eye at one time so keep the organism safe from being exploited to too much sunlight. 

2. the proprioceptors, used for the muscles, in the knee are what received the stimuli from the hammer. 

The reaction from the thigh muscle is to tighten so that the leg kicks up. When a muscle is being hit the body sees that as a threat and the muscles will tighten to be ready to fight back. 

After the squats, the reflex was more vigorous because the body is tired and finds any dangerous threat more seriously because the body has more to focus on. 

3. Humans evolved the reflex of blinking because it can protect the eyes if something is going straight towards the eyes. 

4. The response was a curling of the foot and it is normal because the ideal reaction would be that during an uncomfortable situation the body should stay close and curl up. 

For a person with multiple sclerosis, they may have a different way to react since they are constantly moving and shaking. 

5. The reaction time for the first experiment, with no texting, was a faster reaction time by about 0.2 seconds. This is true because your mind is focusing on two things at once rather than one thing which will slow down the reaction time. My reaction time without texting was an average of 0.196 and my reaction time while texting was 0.367.
The guidelines for a 2-second buffer are for incidences where there is enough time for even the person with the slowest reaction time would be able to stop.

10:1 Drugs resemblance

10:1 Drug resemblance 

In the last couple weeks I have been focusing on how drugs are able to resemble natural oils and smells etc. and also, I have been researching the different types of drugs and which areas of the body they impact. One thing that I have learned is that when cocaine is ingested it blocks the route that dopamine usually takes to the brain causing a build up of free dopamine in the brain creating the overly used pleasure feeling. Cocaine is about 10 times as strong as regular dopamine. 

Next, I tried to find the specific chemicals that are in the drugs and relate them to natural things which is where I came into a slump because when drugs are used they create 10x the amount of dopamine and people who have PTSD are more likely use drugs than the natural transmitters. 

While trying to figure out how o work around the situation I came up with a hypothesis.

Hypothesis: For those who are sufferer from drug abuse, they will be on a cycle that has larger concentrations of an oil that resembles the drug and then the concentration will slowely decrease so that the same amount of dopamine is being used. 

Also, I looked at the people who suffer from anxiety and depression, and turns out that SSRI is a chemical used in antidepressants to release an abundant amount of Serotonin into the body which calms the body down. Some natural serotonin regulators include Vitamin D/C, Tryptophan, omega 3, L-theanine etc. 

My next steps include creating the care packages of different foods and oils to help those who are rescued who are either already on drug abuse or prevention of them on drug abuse. 

The more I research this topic the more I would like to experiment this, though I know I would not have time for it, and that I love neuroscience. 

Learning about these different ways to calm myself down in a chemical and biological way because anxiety can be a form of long term stress. 

The Sheep Brain

The Sheep Brain Dissection 

In this dissection, we started by examining the exterior side of the brain, pinpointing the cerebrum, which controls the integration and data sorting, the cerebellum, which controls the motion and balance of a person, and the brain stem, which connects the spine to the brain and connects to the pons.

Next, we cut the brain longitudinally so that we could see the parts of the brain. Inside we started from the brain stem and went to the pons, which controls the circulation of the blood, and then the medulla oblegada and mid-brain which control the digestion in the body. Then comes the thalamus, which sorts data in the brain, and the hypothalamus, which controls the hormones that help with the homeostasis. Lastly, we have the Corpus Callosum, which separates the left and right hemisphere of the brain, and the Optic nerve, which sends impulses from the retina of the eye to the brain for functioning.

Lastly, we saw the difference in the white matter and the gray matter. The white matter includes all of the myelin that makes up the myelin sheath on the axon that helps send electric signals through the brain at a faster pace.

Eye Dissection Analysis

To begin with the surface of they eye, the eye is covered in fatty tissue to protect the eye, and there are muscles outside of the eye that let the eye move up and down, left and right in the sheep eye since they have 4 muscles but the extra 2 in humans lets us roll our eyes. The outside of the eye is called the sclera and it is very thick so give structure and protection to the eye.

To begin the light pathway, we have the cornea that bends the eyes based on the wavelength of light and in the dissection, it was cloudy because there were no nutrients going into it. Next, the light goes through the aqueous humor which is behind the cornea that gives the cornea the shape and helps the eye stay stiff when in use. after the humor comes the pupil that is controlled by the iris, the colored portion of the eye; the pupil is dark black and will control the amount of light brought in. When the surrounding is dark, the pupil will widen so that as much light as possible can be let in and for the surroundings, with lots of light the pupil is small to limit the amount of light let in. Next, comes the lens. The lens is circular and hard, but smooth (rubbery), and is right behind the pupil. around the lens and pupil are the ciliary bodies contract or relax so that the lens to see things far away or close up. Next, comes the vitreous humor, which is a jelly-like substance behind the lens; the humor keeps the shape of the eye. The retina is a thin layer in behind and resting on the vitreous humor and it is attached to the choroid. The place where the retina attaches to is also called the blind spot. Inside the retina includes the cones and rods which give the color and the shade of the light and then the light goes through the optic nerve which sends chemo-receptors to the brain. In the sheep eye, but not in human eyes, is the tapetum lucidum which reflects light so that nocturnal animals are able to take in, even more, light to the eye so that seeing in the dark becomes easier.

And that is the SHEEP EYE!