Human Body Explorations by Karen Kalumuck and the Exploratorium Teacher Institute

Contents	Page
About Human Body Explorations	5
How to Use This Book	6
Anatomy of an Exploration	6
Before You Begin: potential hazards, cautions, and alternatives	7
The Explorations
Part 1: Your Secret Body Investigations of hidden processes and phenomena
Naked Egg Put de-shelled eggs in different fluids and watch them swell and shrink	11
Cellular Soap Opera Soap films can behave like cell membranes	17
Acid in Your Stomach Find out which antacid is most effective	23
How Much Do You C? Find out how much vitamin C a drink contains	29
How Sweet It Is All sugars are not created equal	37
Milk Makes Me Sick! Find out why many people can't drink milk	43
Got Blood? There's A, B, AB, and O. How can you tell which is which?	49
Mother and Child Reunion Use genetic detective work to match three babies with their mothers	55
Fruitful DNA Extraction See and touch the hereditary molecules	61
What You Can't See CanHurt You Experiment with an unseen form of energy that affects your body	69
The Domino Effect Use dominoes to model a nerve cell's transmission of a signal	75
You've Got Your Nerve! Ordinary beans can model the ions in nerve cells	81
The Arctic in a Cup Find out which materials are best at keeping you warm	87
Part 2: Your Observable Body Investigations of perceivable processes and phenomena
Tunnel of Light Light entering one eye can affect what you see with your other eye	95
Something in Your Eye Illuminate the mysterious branching structure in your eye	99
A "Hole" New Experience Even though it's inside your eye, you can figure out the size of your blind spot	103
The Taste of Color Should you trust your eyes or your sense of taste?	109
Are You a Supertaster? Find out if your tongue may be extrasensitive to bitter tastes	113
The Nose Knows Discover the difference between taste and smell	119
Nose-stalgia Explore the power of scent	125
Merry-Go-Round Illusion With eyes closed, you can tell when you are spinning--but can you tell when you stop?	131
Do You Know Where Your Hands Are? How do you know what your arms, legs, and body are doing without looking?	135
aMAZE-ing Memories With tactile input from your finger, you can create a good mental map of a maze	141
Riddle of the Sphincter How fast does water travel from your mouth to your stomach?	147
Sweaty Fingers Your body sometimes does things without your permission	153
Circle of Nerves How long does it take you to respond to a stimulus?	159
Veins in Your Feet Find out how blood in your veins can flow up to your heart	165
A Knight in Shining Newspaper Estimate the surface area of your birthday suit
Appendix
How This Book Came to Be	175
A Word About Inquiry	175
National Research Council Science Education Standards	175
Using Nonmetric Glassware and Measuring Devices	178
Topic Clusters	178
Resource Guide	179
Acknowledgments	179
Glossary	180
About the Exploratorium/About the Author	184
Photo Credits	184