As miraculous as it is macabre, the human body is home to all that makes us live, and all that will eventually ensure we die.
In honor of the more horrifying aspects of the mortal coil, we bring you a list of nine facts sure to disquiet and disgust.
We produce and swallow 1.5 quarts of phlegm a day
A mix of water and proteins, phlegm or mucus is excreted from the trachea and nose, and the majority of what we produce gets pushed to the back of the throat by microscopic hairs.
On average, we swallow twice a minute, taking 4 beers’ worth of this viscous substance down the hatch and into our stomachs each day.
Your own gut bacteria start to eat you within four minutes of death
Much of the bacteria in our bodies live in the large intestine where they digest food. But within four minutes of us going lights out, it’s feast on for them, as they feed on our tissues, expel noxious methane and ammonia, and move on to the major organs in a charming process known as putrefaction.
When you blush, your stomach lining turns red too
Blushing occurs when blood rises to the surface of the skin, giving the face a signature pink flush.
At the same time we are visibly blushing, a similar blood rush and color injection occurs in the stomach lining.
We poop around 320 pounds of feces each year
On average, a human being excretes about 14 oz of poo a day; over the course of a year, that number climbs, or splashes to 320 lbs, roughly the same weight as an adult panda.
Sperm ejaculates at roughly 28 mph, the speed of a wolverine
Semen is released at the impressive rate of 28 mph, the land speed of the average wolverine.
But they slow their flow when it comes to reproduction: It takes sperm five minutes to travel the 6 inches to the cervix, and can take up to 72 hours to reach an egg.
You are about 1 cm taller in the morning when you first get up than when you go to bed
Because gravity compresses the cartilage in our bodies throughout the day, we are taller in the morning than at night, as the resting position allows the spine to decompress and spread out, giving us a bit of height.
Because of the lack of gravitational force in space, astronauts return to Earth a few inches taller than when they left.
If you stare at yourself in the mirror too long, your brain will distort your image because it gets bored
Vanity is a trip: Staring at your face in the mirror for a few minutes, particularly in low light, distorts your reflection — a phenomenon known as the Troxler effect.
In a 2014 study, 50 healthy adults were asked to stare into a mirror in dim lighting for ten minutes. Results demonstrated that 66% of participants experienced severe facial deformations, 28% saw an unknown person, and 48% saw fantastical and/or monstrous beings.
Your body’s skeleton completely regenerates itself about every 10 years
The body keeps the skeleton strong and healthy through a lifelong process known as bone remodeling, wherein old or damaged tissue is broken down and replaced with new, healthy bone tissue.
Specialized bone cells called osteoclasts handle breakdown, while osteoblasts rebuild. Through their efforts, the entire skeleton is slowly but surely replaced over the course of a decade.
