Anatomy for children. What do you know about skin?
Have you ever seen a hamster? Have you even held it in your arms – stroked it, fed it? Have you seen 35 billion hamsters sitting in a line and crunching carrots (do hamsters like carrots?) What if I told you that our skin has 35 billion hamsters, oh, sorry – 35 billion cells? Yes, imagine that your skin is made of 35 billion cells. Isn’t that a lot? If you took all those little hamsters and really lined them up, they would be enough to go round the sun! Well, you know what I mean – the sun above.
Here are five more interesting facts about skin:
Skin weighs 4 to 8 kilos (so it’s heavier than a bowling ball).
Skin changes completely every few weeks.
Skin cells form faster than any other cells in our bodies.
Lips are one of the few parts of the body that do not have sweat glands, which is why they can be dry and crack in hot weather.
Do you remember carrots? Well, if you eat a lot of carrots, or rather, if you eat them for months, you can increase the level of beta-carotene in your blood. And your skin can turn yellow, your palms will definitely have a carrot tint. What to do? Just stop crunching so many carrots, and everything will be fine. Share with your hamster))
You can read more truths (and fables) about the skin in Adam Kay’s “Anatomy for Children”. This post was really inspired by this book.
