Thermoregulation

• what does our skin act as?


  a heat receptor that detects changes in temperature in the environment and sends impulses to the thermoregulatory centre located in the hypothalamus in the brain
• What are the two types of heat receptors?

  skin and blood vessels
• How do blood vessels act as heat receptors?

  They detect changes in blood temperature and again send impulses to the hypothalamus
• What happens to the hair on your skin when you’re hot?

  the erector muscle relaxes meaning that the hairs lie flat so that heat can escape
• what happens to your hairs when it’s cold?

  the erector muscle tenses causing hairs to stand up on your skin in attempt to trap heat and keep warm
• what happens to the blood vessels/capillaries when you’re hot?

  Vasodilation, so heat escapes through the surface via radiation
• what happens to blood vessels when you’re cold?

  Vasoconstriction, less blood flows so less heat escapes by radiation
• What happens with your adipose tissue as a result of being hot?

  increased metabolic rate so that you burn more calories so fat is lost and you don’t store as much fat
• What happens to your adipose fat as a result of being cold?

  decreased metabolic rate means more fat is stored
• What happens to your muscles when you’re cold?

  shivering (rapid contraction) of skeletal muscles to produce metabolic heat from ATP
• why does burning fat make you less warm?

  because it can be used as thermal insulation making it warmer for a person
• what happens when your tissue dies?

  there will no longer have a blood supply - this makes affected body parts very vulnerable to infection because the body relies on white blood cells to fend off infection