Paper Clip Lab
Paper Clip Lab
By: Daniel Del Carmen
Mrs. McCormic
IBH Biology 12
August 30, 2012
Background Information:
You should find on some parts of your body you can feel the separate points when they are only a few millimeters apart, while for other parts of the body you may need a centimeter or more between them. When we touch something, it changes the shape of our skin slightly. We have nerve cells in our skin that detect these changes in shape and send a message to our brains, letting us know we have touched something. For you to tell the difference between one or two points touching your skin, the points need to be far enough apart to stimulate separate sensors. The different distances you will have found for different parts of our bodies are because our touch sensors are not evenly spread out. In our fingertips, they are only millimeters or so apart, so you only needed a few millimeters between the tips of your paperclip to feel the two points. On our backs, the sensors are more spread out and you would need to separate the points by several centimeters to tell there were two of them. The tips of our tongues have the closest packed touch sensors, with up to 200 per square centimeter.
Question:
Are different parts of your body more sensitive than others?
Hypothesis:
If two points of a 2cm wide paper clip are pressed on different parts of the body such as the tip of the index finger, the back of the neck, the palm of the hand, the bicep, and the knee, then I will be able to determine that different parts of the body are more sensitive than others by checking if one or two points of the paper clip were felt after being poked. I can assume this because I know that there are nerve cells in our skin that send impulses to our brain letting us know if we have touched something. Different parts of our body contain more touch sensors than others because they are not evenly spread out and from this lab; I want to prove this point true.
Variables:
By: Daniel Del Carmen
Mrs. McCormic
IBH Biology 12
August 30, 2012
Background Information:
You should find on some parts of your body you can feel the separate points when they are only a few millimeters apart, while for other parts of the body you may need a centimeter or more between them. When we touch something, it changes the shape of our skin slightly. We have nerve cells in our skin that detect these changes in shape and send a message to our brains, letting us know we have touched something. For you to tell the difference between one or two points touching your skin, the points need to be far enough apart to stimulate separate sensors. The different distances you will have found for different parts of our bodies are because our touch sensors are not evenly spread out. In our fingertips, they are only millimeters or so apart, so you only needed a few millimeters between the tips of your paperclip to feel the two points. On our backs, the sensors are more spread out and you would need to separate the points by several centimeters to tell there were two of them. The tips of our tongues have the closest packed touch sensors, with up to 200 per square centimeter.
Question:
Are different parts of your body more sensitive than others?
Hypothesis:
If two points of a 2cm wide paper clip are pressed on different parts of the body such as the tip of the index finger, the back of the neck, the palm of the hand, the bicep, and the knee, then I will be able to determine that different parts of the body are more sensitive than others by checking if one or two points of the paper clip were felt after being poked. I can assume this because I know that there are nerve cells in our skin that send impulses to our brain letting us know if we have touched something. Different parts of our body contain more touch sensors than others because they are not evenly spread out and from this lab; I want to prove this point true.
Variables: