Bodies Exhibit

Over the weekend I visited the Bodies Exhibit in downtown Seattle. What an educational experience that was! I went with my very dear friend Olivia and her husband, Oz, and we spent a good couple hours wandering the exhibit filled with real human bodies and parts.


Here are some things I remember (quite an impressive list, even for my memory!):

• 20-30% of total calories burned is burned by your brain.
• Scientists say that lack of oxygen isn’t the reason you yawn. But they cannot confirm why exactly you DO yawn… hmmm, helpful.
• Your brain accounts for 2% of your body weight.
• Everyone is a single cell for about a half hour after being conceived.
• The female heart typically beats faster than a male’s heart.
• The female tongue has more taste buds than a man’s therefore we can truly appreciate the taste of yummy food that much better!
• We shed approximately 1 ½ pounds of skin each year. Ick!!
• The production of a man’s baby-makin’-material starts to decrease at the age of 35.
• The exhibit as a whole features about 10 whole bodies and uses about 10 more for various parts/organ displays.
• The picture below is somewhat of an optical illusion. The left figure is the skeletal figure of the muscular figure on the right. It’s amazing what scientists can do to extract and re-group all the bones in a body!

• One of the most interesting displays was of the body’s blood system. Using some type of chemical, they pumped all the blood vessels, arteries and capillaries to highlight and preserve. Then they use another chemical to dissolve the mass around it and the result is below… a view of ALL out blood flowing throughout our body. CRAZY!

• Here is a picture of the fetus display they had. Interesting to see how much they grow in such a short period of time.

• Several interesting displays included various examples of healthy vs. diseased organs. One that stuck out most to me was of the lungs. Here is a picture showing the difference between healthy lungs and lungs of a smoker. Booo! Everyone should stop smoking!

This isn’t really on the list so I technically can’t check it off, but it was a very amazing experience to learn so much about the human body. It really is one of the most complex creations and it’s amazing to think that it all works so seamlessly without us being aware (most of the time). I don’t think I’d pay to see it twice (just because I’m not a science-nerd) but I would definitely recommend everyone go at least once.