Imagine being able to sleep for 5-7 months and not have to wake up to eat, drink, or go to the bathroom! That's what bears do regularly every winter. Physiologists are interested in how they do this. They think it may partly be because of how bears hearts beat. They go from 5-10 beats per minute to 60-70 beats per minute and then back. This strange rhythm could allow the heart to move the most blood when it has the most oxygen. When we are bedridden, our muscles get very weak but bears have a bone-building hormone that keeps this from happening. But hibernating bears may be able to cure kidney, bone, and muscle illnesses because their kidneys shut down when they hibernate and they have that hormone which keeps them strong while they wait for winter to be over.
Although humans kidneys usually filter urea (which is a by-product of muscles breaking down) out of our blood by going to the bathroom, bears can't do this as they sleep. So their kidneys simply shut down while they sleep with no trouble, and then when they wake up they start back up again! Amazing, huh? This could help people with kidney disease get much better, or at the very least, prevent it from happening.
When bears wake up each spring, they walk right out and start their life again, but when humans have to stay in bed for a long time, they are very weak and have to build their bones and muscles up so that they can return to normal. Seth Donahue (a bio-medical engineer) found that bears have a bone-building hormone that makes the bones stay strong while they sleep. He wants to make a medicine that is based on what the bears bodies do. We humans have a weaker version of this same hormone, but it is not enough to do what the bears do. If he succeeds, we will have an amazing medicine that will cure weak bones and muscles. "We think the bear version will make an even better drug," says Donahue, (Staying in Shape, 3). This means that the bear hormone to keep bones strong will work even better than the drug they made out of ours.
In conclusion, since the kidneys of bears can shut down and they have a hormone that keeps their bones strong, we may be able to cure some human illnesses, including kidney, bone, and muscle diseases! Observing bears might even let us sleep for a longer time, although probably not seven months!
YOU ARE READING
Essays
RandomSo, this is just a place where I put all of the essays that I type, so that I can save them forever, and if I accidentally delete them on Google Docs, I still have another copy- on here. :) I'm not really worried about people reading this, but you c...
