Human body mathematics - Columbia Daily Tribune

Your body is an incredible biological machine that has been improved upon through millions of years of evolution. The human body does some amazing things, but possibly just as amazing are the numbers associated with our body. Let’s take a look at some almost unbelievable numbers associated with the ordinary aspects of your body. This will make you think about what is happening inside you in very different ways.

Volume is the measurement of how much space something takes up. The volume of milk is measured in gallons. The volume of a house is measured in square feet and so on. Mass is the measurement of how much matter is in a certain object. Your body has some pretty incredible volume and mass numbers associated with it. Here are just a few examples:

Mucus – if you are sick your body could fill an entire 2-liter soda bottle with mucus every day. The number is about half of that when you are healthy. Very little of that is actually blown out into a tissue. Instead, most of that travels down your throat and into your stomach. It may sound horrible, but mucus is an essential tool your body uses to keep you healthy.

Waste – It’s something we all produce but it’s something most of us don’t like to talk about. Your body produces about 1.5 liters of urine a day (if you are drinking a healthy amount of water). How much is that over your lifetime? Would a lifetime of your urine fill a swimming pool? Well, there are different-sized pools. You and your closest 60 friends would fill up one Olympic-sized swimming pool in your lifetimes.

Your body also produces about one pound of solid waste per day. That’s not too bad until you consider all the humans on Earth. Every year, the human population produces 640 billion pounds of solid human waste.

Sweat – This one is tricky to measure as it can vary significantly depending on your activity, the weather, your body, and how much water you consume. If you average it all out, you sweat about a liter a day through your 3 million sweat glands. Girls have more sweat glands than boys but boys have more active sweat glands. The sweat you produce is mostly used to help regulate your body temperature.

Saliva – Your mouth probably isn’t watering while reading this article, but on an average day your body produces about 1.25 liters of saliva. The saliva starts the digestive process, lubricates the foods you swallow, and helps fight off bacteria in your mouth.

Sneezing – Sneezes are incredible! However, the popular saying that sneezes travel at 100 miles per hour has been hard to prove. Instead, it appears that the average sneeze shoots particles out of your mouth at about 40-75 miles per hour. That is still impressive! A sneeze expels up to 100,000 germs up to 20 feet away from your body. Sneezing into a tissue or your sleeve cuts down those numbers significantly and earns you more friends.

Coughing – Coughing is not quite as bad as a sneeze but it isn’t pleasant either. An average cough expels about 3,000 saliva droplets out of your mouth at a speed of about 50 miles per hour.

Hair – Hair can be beautiful and you produce a lot of it. In your lifetime, each strand of your hair grows about 400 inches. Considering that you have about 100,000 hair follicles, your body produces over 600 miles worth of hair in your lifetime.

Skin – Your skin cells are constantly reproducing and replacing themselves. Every year, your body produces about 9 pounds of new skin cells. The old skin cells flake off of your body but it is a misconception that most of the dust in your house is from skin cells. Some of it is but most of your dead skin cells go down the drain when you shower.

Tears – If all of these body numbers have you in tears then you are adding to the 81 liters of tears that your body produces every year. Some people certainly cry more than others but tears are not always associated with crying. The vast majority of your tears stay in your eyes to keep them moist and clean. And honestly, these numbers shouldn’t make you cry. They are all part of producing and running your incredible human body.

Mike Szydlowski is the science coordinator for Columbia Public Schools.

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