Homeostasis In The Muscular System - Home

Homeostasis in the Muscular System

Home

HOMEOSTASIS

Homeostasis Diagram What is homeostasis? Homeostasis is the process which the body is able to maintain a state of stable physiological balance or basically maintain equilibrium. If we didn’t have homeostasis in our bodies, we would not be able to survive! Stimulus-A change occurs in the internal or external environment that disturbs homeostasis. (Heat, cold, noise, pressure, lack of oxygen are external stimulus. Internal stimulus includes changes in blood pressure, pH balance, salt concentration, high or low blood sugar.) Receptors-A sensor that monitors the environment and responds to the stimulus by sending information to the control centre. The flow of the information occurs along the afferent pathway. Control Centre-determines a set point and is where a variable is to be maintained. A set point is the level or range. Information travels from the control centre to the effector along efferent pathway. Effector-provides means for the control centres response to the stimulus. The results of the response feed back to influence the stimulus. Feedback-it can either be positive or negative. Negative feedback depresses the stimulus so that the whole control mechanism is shut off. Most of the body’s homeostatic mechanism are negative feedback systems. Negative feedback returns the body from being outside the steady state (too high, too low) back to the steady state. Positive feedback enhances the stimulus so that the reaction continues at an even faster rate. Feedback is positive as change occurs in the same direction as original stimulus and causes variable to deviate further from original range and usually controls infrequent events. Communication between the receptor, control centre and effector is essential for normal operation of the system. Homeostatic Imbalance-most disease is seen to be the result of homeostatic disturbances. The internal environment becomes less stable as we age, therefore there is greater risk for illnesses in the aged people.

THE MUSCULAR SYSTEM

What is the muscular system? The muscular system is part of our body that helps us to move around and to function correctly.There are 3 types of muscles in the human body: · Cardiac Muscle-involuntary, found only in the heart.· Skeletal Muscle-voluntary, found throughout the whole body.· Smooth Muscle-involuntary, found in internal organs. Why is the muscular system important? Firstly without muscles, we cannot move, we cannot function, and we wouldn’t be alive!! The human body consists of around 650 muscles and all these muscles have varied roles. Some roles of muscles are movement, heat generation, food digestion and breathing and blood circulation. We need the skeletal muscle mainly for movement. The skeletal muscle is attached to bones by tendons. The skeletal muscle also helps to generate heat in the human body. Smooth muscle is the internal organs such as the stomach. So think of the digestive system digesting food and excreting it, that is the smooth muscles functions, well for the digestive side at least! Now cardiac muscle. Cardiac muscle is found only in the heart and its function in the muscular system is to pump blood and oxygen to the cells of the body and the blood moving around the body also removes carbon dioxide from the cells of the body and its contracting is from homeostasis which is what keeps us alive.

The role of Homeostasis in the muscular system

How does homeostasis play a role in the muscular system? The muscular system maintains homeostasis by a number of different ways. An easy example to explain homeostasis of the skeletal muscle is when you are cold, you start to shiver. Your muscles generate heat. Because the muscles generate heat, this ceases the shivering when they provide heat. This is homeostasis in the skeletal muscles. Your body must maintain the average temperature (37°) and when your body shivers it is because your body has dropped below that temperature. For your body to get back up to that temperature it uses homeostasis of the skeletal muscles by generating heat to warm you up. Essentially, if our body could not do this, we would freeze to death. The opposite of this is when your body has too much heat, you begin to sweat, and this sweat cools the body down back to 37° therefore maintaining homeostasis and balancing out the body’s temperature. Smooth muscles are your internal organs. These muscles, unlike skeletal muscle are involuntary meaning that they undergo all their functions by themselves under not conscious control without us telling our brain to do so. Homeostasis is maintained in smooth muscles by them functioning doing their job internally for us. If we weren’t digesting and if we weren’t getting our food pushed down then how would we survive? Thanks to the smooth muscles all our internal organs function for our body to maintain its equilibrium. Homeostasis in cardiac muscle is quite an important one. Without cardiac muscle (the heart) we would not be able to survive at all! Homeostasis has numerous roles within the heart, heart rate and even the delivery of blood and oxygen from the heart to the rest of the muscles in the body. The heart rate goes up during exercise, to stabilize itself the heart needs to rest so when exercise is stopped the heart rate decreases, balancing the heart rate out. The heart, with each contraction pumps blood and oxygen to supply all the other muscles with so they can function and work properly. Without the blood and oxygen delivery, the muscles would fail. This also removes the carbon dioxide from the muscle cells while the blood and oxygen get delivered to them via the blood. So theoretically, if the cells could get oxygen on their own without the need of blood, we wouldn’t need a heart! Homeostasis all relates to the nervous system. The nervous system sends and receives messages to make homeostasis possible. The nervous system is made up of the brain, neurons and the spinal cord. Now back to how this relates to homeostasis and the muscular system! The heart simply cannot function without the connection of it to the brain. The brain is what helps the heart to provide, produce and maintain homeostasis. There is 5 parts in the brain, but I will just mention the 1 part that controls the heart and its beating. It is called the medulla. Basically the medulla sends and receives messages in the form of chemicals or hormones from the nerves in the body. These messages go to a part of the medulla called the medullary pyramids. The medulla is always receiving these messages from the nerves which are communication pathways to and from muscles, organs and some other parts of your body. When you exercise the medulla receives a message from your working muscles in that exercise (skeletal and cardiac). The medulla then releases two chemicals called epinephrine and norepinephrine. These chemicals travel along the nervous system to the hearts sinus node. The sinus node is what makes the heart contract. Homeostasis is maintained by travelling along the nervous system to do this. When you stop the exercise, a new chemical called acetylcholine is sent from the medulla to the heart and other muscles after the medulla receives the message from the muscles that exercise has been stopped. This new chemical slows the heart rate, providing slower contraction to the ones during exercise, maintaining the equilibrium. Homeostatic functions of the muscular system include: ensuring vital functions such as nutrition (through body movement), smooth muscle maintains blood pressure and cardiac muscle circulates bloods. Conclusion: In conclusion, without homeostasis the body would simply fail, it would not survive it would be useless. We need the balanced internal and external environment of homeostasis as it is as necessary as breathing!!! Just think of it this way, without homeostasis how would your food digest? How would your body move? How would you circulate blood? How would your heart actually beat? Without homeostasis, we the human race would cease to exist. Not only do muscles in the body need homeostasis but it is our entire body that requires the balanced internal and external environment of homeostasis. Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates. Get Started