Diane
18-09-2006, 12:59 AM
Earlier today I went to Scienceworld here in Vancouver for my first visit to Bodyworlds (http://www.scienceworld.bc.ca/bodyworlds/index.html), the anatomy exhibit. Tip: definitely get a ticket online first. I felt very organized as I walked swiftly in past the l-o-n-g lineup.
I rented an audio device for an extra $5, which came programmed either "basic" or "advanced." Through it I learned all sorts of fascinating bits and dabs, That I either never knew or once knew and forgot, such as "the skeleton only weighs about 20 pounds", "a newborn has 360 bones, an adult only 206", "the skin, weighing 20 pounds, is the heaviest organ in the body."
The vascular plastinations are a riot of red. The lung section will convince you to never smoke again. An entire 9 meter (30 foot) intestine is mounted against glass, fully detached from its mesenteries, S-ed out several times for full effect. Various hearts are variously cross-sectioned; various arteries show various stages of arteriosclerosis.
I was very pleased to see that the peripheral nervous system is preserved in most of the whole body mounts, long fibers of it swirling and spiralling down the limbs, woven through equally spiralled mesoderm in all the various extreme poses presented. Whole brachial and lumbosacral plexuses are visible through windows cut out of the bodies. At the major bends in the body, hips, shoulders, knees, elbows, the nerves are clearly visible and identifiable relative to one another. One display is strictly the CNS/PNS only, cascades of nerve fibers that become finer and more numerous the more distal they are located, like a fringed inner costume. The trunk cutaneous nerves were missing on that particular display, but readily visible on most. I was a bit surprised actually, at how large they really are, on the back and sides of the body. Entirely palpable. It's not just my imagination that I can palpate them. On the lower half of the back of the trunk, they fan obliquely downwards in exact right angles to the fibres of latissimus dorsi. So right under the skin. So vulnerable.
I saw lots of people with digital cameras in there, unbothered by custodians, so on my next trip I will go armed with one myself.
I rented an audio device for an extra $5, which came programmed either "basic" or "advanced." Through it I learned all sorts of fascinating bits and dabs, That I either never knew or once knew and forgot, such as "the skeleton only weighs about 20 pounds", "a newborn has 360 bones, an adult only 206", "the skin, weighing 20 pounds, is the heaviest organ in the body."
The vascular plastinations are a riot of red. The lung section will convince you to never smoke again. An entire 9 meter (30 foot) intestine is mounted against glass, fully detached from its mesenteries, S-ed out several times for full effect. Various hearts are variously cross-sectioned; various arteries show various stages of arteriosclerosis.
I was very pleased to see that the peripheral nervous system is preserved in most of the whole body mounts, long fibers of it swirling and spiralling down the limbs, woven through equally spiralled mesoderm in all the various extreme poses presented. Whole brachial and lumbosacral plexuses are visible through windows cut out of the bodies. At the major bends in the body, hips, shoulders, knees, elbows, the nerves are clearly visible and identifiable relative to one another. One display is strictly the CNS/PNS only, cascades of nerve fibers that become finer and more numerous the more distal they are located, like a fringed inner costume. The trunk cutaneous nerves were missing on that particular display, but readily visible on most. I was a bit surprised actually, at how large they really are, on the back and sides of the body. Entirely palpable. It's not just my imagination that I can palpate them. On the lower half of the back of the trunk, they fan obliquely downwards in exact right angles to the fibres of latissimus dorsi. So right under the skin. So vulnerable.
I saw lots of people with digital cameras in there, unbothered by custodians, so on my next trip I will go armed with one myself.