[Racoon]

From ATP to Vestibular nuclei, the body's chemistry is facinating and very complex!
Even as we simply type on our computers, the human body is performing myriad tasks, primarily for homeostasis.
I am studying Exercise Physiology right now, and it really puts things in a new perspective.
REMEMBER THIS: Get out there and do some exercise! jogging, cycling, walking, swimming, anything, JUST DO IT! Your body will thank you!

The control of voluntary movement is complex and requires cooperation from many areas of the brain.
First, subcortical and cortical structures send signals to the association cortex, which forms a "rough draft" of planned movement. The movement plan is then sent to the cerebellum and basal ganglia which convert "rough draft" into precise temporal and excitation programs. From there it goes through the thalamus to the motor cortex, which then forwards said message down those good ol' spinal nuerons, and finally towards skeletal muscle!
There is also a feedback loop to the Central Nervous System (CNS) from muscle receptors and proprioceptors which allows for modification of those motor programs.

Everytime you participate in exercise/sport, the brain does this, but we don't usually think about it obviously.
NEXT POST I'll talk a little more about skeletal muscle;
MEANWHILE, MAKE SURE ALL YOU HYPOGRAPHITES GET ADEQUATE EXERCISE!! Its fun! or at least its good for you

As the New Years resolutions are getting made, I suspect this could be a popular thread!

[GAHD]

Oh yes, the internal chemistry and structure is definatly amaising. Another thing to remember when working out is to target the muscle types you need more often; white muscle and red muscle are both useful, but each has it's areas where it excells.

[Drosera]

EXERCISE?!?!?!


With a foot and a half of freshly fallen snow, and more on the way?


Do you have any idea how cold it is out there?


What do you want me to do? Run up and down my hallway for 1/2 hour?



I tease.

But I do have to admit that winter is **NOT** a good time of year for to exercise. That is to say I become completely unmotivated. I love snow, but seriously HATE the cold. All the more reason to exercise I know, but ooof! Odd though, because when I have to, and the conditions are acceptable, I do bicycle in the winter. I do love my bike!

I totally agree about the amazingness of the body, even though I don't understand it's complexities anywhere near as much as you. But when you think of all the things a body does, it leaves you in awe!

Take care!

[Boerseun]

This is me apologizin'.

I opened a reply on this here sucker, and I'm sitting with a lank slow 'net connection. So, when it eventually opened for a reply, I could not for the life of me remember what I was a' plannin' on replyin'.

I apologize like a sumbitch.

Cya folks on the flipside...

[Edge]

I always wondered if emotions are part of a chemical process.

[jkellmd]

I love the enthusiasm, Rac!

[Tormod]

Originally Posted by Racoon

MEANWHILE, MAKE SURE ALL YOU HYPOGRAPHITES GET ADEQUATE EXERCISE!! Its fun! or at least its good for you

Good call. I recently took up going to the gym again and it's definitely a Very Good Thing.

[Boerseun]

Originally Posted by Racoon

Heres a Biology Joke:
Whats the difference between a Hormone and an Enzyme ??

You can't hear an Enzyme..

WHAAAAAHAAAHAAAHAAHAHAHA!!!!

Good one!

[Turtle]

___This is amazing! My ignorance of chemistry is showing.

___I have a long familiarity with exercise however, & I am anxious to understand the chemical processes at play. For example, given the three categories of exercise, miometric, plyometric, & isometric, what variations in the chemistry at play is observed? (Mmmmm. did I leave out a ...metric form of exercise? ) Anyway, those three suffice for now.

Off to do some chores....er....exercise.

[Turtle]

___Back in the 60's I was using an exercise book that broke exercise into those three categories. I checked my home dictionary & didn't find the terms. I just read your post (thank you very much) & that prompted me to Google. Here is one link that sounds like what you have said & a quote from the paper that pertains to the terms isometric, pliometric, & miometric.
Thanks again.

http://jap.physiology.org/cgi/conten.../95/2/455#SEC1

Because the dictionary definition of "to contract" is "to generate force" and "to shorten," a number of investigators have modified the terms action (15) and condition (24) to signify the type of contraction that occurred. Fick (15) employed the terms "isometric" and "isotonic" to describe the actions of a contracting heart muscle when the muscle remained at a fixed length or shortened with a fixed load. In 1938, Fenn (12) noted that shortening, isometric, and lengthening more accurately represented the three types of contractions that muscles make than the terms proposed by Fick, but Fenn was careful to dissociate the directionality of the muscle movement from the term contraction. The same year, in correlating the contractions of muscles of humans with the movements of the limbs during walking and running, Hubbard and Stetson (24) recognized that muscles underwent contractions during three different "conditions." The three conditions were termed "miometric," "isometric," and "pliometric," by coupling the Greek prefixes "mio" (shorter), "iso" (same), and "plio" (longer) to the noun "metric," defined as "pertaining to measures or measurement." Consequently, the noun condition was used with the appropriate adjective to differentiate among the three conditions under which the muscles "contracted."