Heat and the Human Body: Shedding Light on Heat, Episode 6

This video is an excerpt from Shedding Light on Heat Episode 6: Heat and the Human Body, part of the Shedding Light on Heat series aimed at students in about Year 9 level.

Visit our website to see details about how you can view the whole program, and to download the student activity sheets.

In this program, we look at the brilliant systems within our bodies that allow us to maintain a more-or-less constant body temperature regardless of the weather conditions. Sweating, shivering, pumping more blood to some parts of our bodies than to other parts, curling up into a ball, and spreading out your arms and legs all play their part at keeping our bodies at the right temperature! But what happens when we reach our limits?

Contents:

Part A: Introduction. Humans (and all mammals and birds) are endothermic; we can keep our internal temperature the same regardless of the conditions.

Part B: Changing our Surface Area: Why do we spread out our arms and our legs when we’re feeling hot but fold our arms over our chest when we’re feeling cold?

Part C: Blood: Blood doesn’t just carry oxygen and other chemicals around in our bodies. It also carries heat energy around so it can take heat energy from one part of the body to another.


Part D: Sweating and Shivering: Why do we shiver when we’re feeling cold? How does sweating cool us down when we’re feeling hot? How much sweat do you actually lose on a hot day?


Part E: Hypothermia and Hyperthermia: Though our bodies can maintain a constant core temperature, there’s a limit to what we can handle. If our internal temperature rises too much or falls too much we can die. We’ll show you how easily it can happen.

This excerpt (and the actual program) uses images from Josikins, BruceBlaus, and Forsyth Tech CPL.

Our Shedding Light videos are available on ClickView, Learn360, Films on Demand, and SAFARI Montage.

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