at the surface of it all a velvety
overcoat of cells and protein keeps us
in and the rest of the world out
it is our armor
our radiator our entree to pain and
pleasure
it is the body’s largest organ our skin
smooth and silky to the eyes and touch a
closer look presents a very different
landscape magnified 600 times our
outermost skin is nothing but dead cells
riddled with ridges and grooves and
popped with countless bumps and holes
look closer still and we find hundreds
of thousands of bacteria inhabit every
square inch of us
with every tick of the clock our dead
skin gets left off we shed at least
600,000 particles of skin an hour
about a pound and a half’s worth each
year which accounts for as much as 80%
of the dust in our houses
but there’s plenty of skin to go around
if we could peel it off and lay it out
flat the average person’s skin would
cover some 18 square feet though just
millimeters thick it would weigh about 6
pounds and we’re constantly making more
just wait a month or so and you too will
have a shiny new coat which means skin
can’t be all dead dip below the surface
and you find cells continuously dividing
to replace those dead cells above vials
of blood vessels pulse to skin’s
connective tissues
the
and let’s not forget all those precious
nerve endings 45 miles worth of nerves
stretch from our heads down to our toes
and many reach to our skin some parts
more than others
if sensitivity were size dependent we
would look something like this our
super-sensitive hands feet tongue and
lips
each packed with touch receptors would
swell enormous ly our legs on the other
hand would resemble a chicken’s good
thing for us there is more to this organ
than touch
skin is also our heating and cooling
system and by helping maintain that
comfy 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit it keeps
us alive through its network of blood
vessels skin carries as much as one
third of the hearts hot freshly pumped
blood get too hot and these vessels can
widen to release from our bodies but
sometimes that’s not enough
a good workout can raise the body’s
temperature several degrees above normal
a potentially deadly state if it weren’t
for skin slick safety then sweat
the more than 2 million holes across our
skin can produce up to 1/2 gallon of the
liquid in an hour
the heated droplets evaporate into the
air and leave the body cool
through a special camera that images
heat not light we can see this
air-conditioning system at work the
hotter the body the deeper the red
no surprise some of the warmest parts of
our bodies our foreheads palms and
armpits correlate with the greatest
concentration of sweat glands
but we’re more likely to encounter the
opposite extreme in our morning routine
exposed to a chill tiny muscles jerk our
hairs to attention bulging the skin
around them we call them
goosebumps
you
overcoat of cells and protein keeps us
in and the rest of the world out
it is our armor
our radiator our entree to pain and
pleasure
it is the body’s largest organ our skin
smooth and silky to the eyes and touch a
closer look presents a very different
landscape magnified 600 times our
outermost skin is nothing but dead cells
riddled with ridges and grooves and
popped with countless bumps and holes
look closer still and we find hundreds
of thousands of bacteria inhabit every
square inch of us
with every tick of the clock our dead
skin gets left off we shed at least
600,000 particles of skin an hour
about a pound and a half’s worth each
year which accounts for as much as 80%
of the dust in our houses
but there’s plenty of skin to go around
if we could peel it off and lay it out
flat the average person’s skin would
cover some 18 square feet though just
millimeters thick it would weigh about 6
pounds and we’re constantly making more
just wait a month or so and you too will
have a shiny new coat which means skin
can’t be all dead dip below the surface
and you find cells continuously dividing
to replace those dead cells above vials
of blood vessels pulse to skin’s
connective tissues
the
and let’s not forget all those precious
nerve endings 45 miles worth of nerves
stretch from our heads down to our toes
and many reach to our skin some parts
more than others
if sensitivity were size dependent we
would look something like this our
super-sensitive hands feet tongue and
lips
each packed with touch receptors would
swell enormous ly our legs on the other
hand would resemble a chicken’s good
thing for us there is more to this organ
than touch
skin is also our heating and cooling
system and by helping maintain that
comfy 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit it keeps
us alive through its network of blood
vessels skin carries as much as one
third of the hearts hot freshly pumped
blood get too hot and these vessels can
widen to release from our bodies but
sometimes that’s not enough
a good workout can raise the body’s
temperature several degrees above normal
a potentially deadly state if it weren’t
for skin slick safety then sweat
the more than 2 million holes across our
skin can produce up to 1/2 gallon of the
liquid in an hour
the heated droplets evaporate into the
air and leave the body cool
through a special camera that images
heat not light we can see this
air-conditioning system at work the
hotter the body the deeper the red
no surprise some of the warmest parts of
our bodies our foreheads palms and
armpits correlate with the greatest
concentration of sweat glands
but we’re more likely to encounter the
opposite extreme in our morning routine
exposed to a chill tiny muscles jerk our
hairs to attention bulging the skin
around them we call them
goosebumps
you
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