Closing Pandora's Box

This is a song EllaUnread posted on her blog. I loved it, and so borrowed (without asking) it to share with you guys:

I’ve had a bit of a tough and tiring week, and this song really put a smile on my face (thank you Ella). And I hope it puts a smile on yours too.

Have a lovely weekend everyone. :)

[ This is a scheduled post ]

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Title: On the bright side – NeverShoutNever!

Date: One Thursday morning last year.

Location: Dissection room.

Setting: (isn’t this partly the location?) We had just cut through the rib cage, and were trying to remove the heart from the chest, cutting away the connective tissue and all the other attachments. I hadn’t prepared for this anatomy session, and so pretended to read from my book in which I should have taken notes and done the directed self learning exercises. The following was the only contribution I made in the whole hour or so, apart from do my share of cutting with the scalpel and tugging away at the pericardium (the protective ‘sack’ like structure in which the heart sits).

Sophie: That heart is huge! (places fist on top, and the other) Even if I had three fists I don’t think they’d cover the size that heart.

Me: He must’ve been a really nice guy. He is a guy isn’t he? (Checks the cadavers genitals). Yeah a really nice guy.

Sophie: What? Big heart? Oh I get it!

Supervisor: Can anyone tell me what this particular condition is called? What about you Nas?

Me: (mutters) Ummm… being too nice-itis?

*****

Setting: My little brother is singing a love song that is stuck in his head. We’re walking together, carrying bags of Sainsbury shopping. He stops singing, puts on his ‘thinking’ face, and turns to look at me.

Brother: Hmm, you know how people that are in love, why do they always talk about missing heart beats? If I missed a heart beat, would I die?

Me: (rolls eyes) Ummm, I don’t know…

Brother: What do they teach you at uni? You never have an answer to any of my questions. So useless.

*****

“CVS,” she said. “I have CVS module up next. Do some posts on that.” This one is for you AcetylCholine.

The cardiovascular system consists of 2 main things; the heart and the blood vessels (veins, arteries and capillaries) and if you want to be technical, all the stuff inside. The circulatory system can be divided into 3 parts – the pulmonary circulation (this takes deoxygenated, i.e. blood with no oxygen to the lungs via the pulmonary arteries and brings it back, through the pulmonary veins), the systemic circulation (blood from the the left ventricle is pumped to all parts of the body, via branches of the aorta), and the coronary circulation (provides oxygen and nutrients to the heart muscle). The circulatory system is closed, meaning that no blood ever leaves the system. If there is a break in this, and blood seeps out from the vessels, it is known as a haemorrhage. The functions of the circulatory system are many:

• Transfer of nutrients around the body (breakdown of things you eat, amino acids, salts, sugars).
• The transfer of oxygen to, and carbon dioxide from all the cells in the body and other gases as well.
• Carries blood cells (such as white cells which form an integral part of the human immune system and fight infection and disease).
• Regulation of body temperature, pH, and homeostasis.

Development of the heart

• The heart is the first organ of the body to develop and function.
• It is formed from a simple crescent of cells of the mesoderm (middle layer) of the embryo.
• The crescent contains endocardial cells, which organise to form a tube with a lumen (the hole in a tube, think of toilet roll tubes) all surrounded by myocardial (heart muscle) cells. The tube expands, elongates, bends, loops, balloons to form the various structures of the heart.
• Disorders include: atrioventricular septal defect, atrial septal defect, ventricular septal defect, tetralogy of Fallot.

Bending / looping of the heart tube (Scanning electron microscope images of mouse hearts)

Download: Development of the heart and its conduction system (lecture slides, PDF)

The cardiac cycle

• Heart muscle is described as being myogenic, that is to say, it beats of it’s own accord and without any outside stimulus. (Video: Heart cells beating in a petri dish).
• For efficient pumping of blood around the body, the heart must pump in a specific order, allowing for filling of the atria first and then the ventricles and lastly contraction of the ventricles ejecting blood out of the heart into the aorta (to the body) or the pulmonary artery (to the lungs).
• Valves play an integral role in making sure blood doesn’t go backwards. A lot of valve disorders can be diagnosed from knowledge of the cardiac cycle. (Video: Heart cycle)
• In a healthy  and fit individual, each cycle lasts approximately 1 second, meaning, there are approximately 60 beats per minute.
• Disorders include: aortic stenosis, aortic valve incompetence (regurgitation), mitral stenosis, mitral valve incompetence, tricuspid stenosis, tricuspid valve incompetence.

Download: The cardiac cycle, heart sounds & murmurs (Scanned lecture notes)
Download: The control of stroke volume in health & heart failure (Scanned notes)
Download: Cardiac contraction pharmacology (notes, PDF)

Blood vessels

• The 5 main types of blood vessels are arteries, arterioles, capillaries, venules and veins.
• Arteries contain a thick muscular layer in their walls, allowing them to withstand the high pressure of blood being pumped directly from the heart.
• Arterioles are literally small arteries, being microscopic vessels that regulate blood flow in the capillary network. They contain fenestrations (holes) in their walls.
• Capillaries are the smallest of blood vessels and connect the oxygenated arterioles to the venules in a u-turn type fashion. They are found almost every cell in the body, but their number varies with the metabolic activity of the tissue. For example, those body tissues that have a high metabolic demand, such as muscles, the brain, liver, kidneys use more oxygen and nutrients and thus have extensive capillary networks. Structurally, they are extremely thin (consisting of just a single layer of endothelial cells and basement membrane). This aids diffusion as the distance for diffusion is less (Fick’s law of diffusion).
• Venules are thinner than arterioles and are responsible for draining blood from the capillaries and begin the return flow of blood back to the heart.
• Veins have the same structure as arteries but each layer is relatively thicker, and thus they have a greater lumen (hole in the middle). Blood pressure is the veins is much less than in arteries and so in places such as the lower limbs, muscle contractions aid the movement of blood back to the heart.
• Blood vessels can contract and relax in response to both external stimuli (from the sympathetic nervous system) and local stimuli (paracrine agents such as nitric oxide, endothelin, autacoids). Physical factors such as temperature can also have an effect. This is important in regulating blood pressure and allows the brain to specifically alter blood flow to a particular organ.

Download: Blood pressure, peripheral resistance & haemodynamics (lecture notes)
Download: Nervous and hormonal control of blood pressure (lecture notes)
Download: Pharmacology of vascular smooth muscle (notes PDF)

*****

As you can imagine this is an extremely large topic, and thus I hope this is an adequate introduction. You better be grateful AcetylCholine!

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Picture 1 – Showing heart, taken from here.
Picture 2 – Showing part of the circulatory system, taken from here.
Picture 3 – Showing development of the heart tube, taken from lecture notes.
Picture 4 – Showing structure of the heart, taken from here.
Picture 5 – Showing cardiac cycle, taken from lecture notes.
Picture 6 – Showing the structure of blood vessels, taken from here.

I previously told everyone I would be starting a medical section to my blog after a suggestion from one of the readers. Having thought about it, and discussed it with a few people, I have decided it shall be divided into 2 categories:

1. Medical Matters: This shall be informative, providing factual information, be it the etiology (cause of disease), symptoms, diagnosis (identification), prognosis (expected outcome of disease) and treatment. It may not even be about a particular disease or disorder but an introduction to a part of the body, how it is controlled and its functions.
   
   
2. Medical Myths: This is what inspired this whole medical writing, and shall deal with various myths the general lay public hear from their grandmothers or their best friend Carol’s dog's sister’s mother down at the pub, things that appear in the news, and discuss whether these actually work or are scams to separate you from your beloved money. Like for example the following, which is complete and utter BS:
   

*****

A few months ago, a trial carried out at Oxford university generated huge publicity in the media as seemingly a cure for Alzheimer’s disease had been found that was easily obtainable at the  local shop for less than £1.00. Researcher’s showed that eating high levels of Vitamins B6, B12 and folic acid reduced circulating levels of homocysteine, an amino acid thought be responsible for abnormal brain shrinkage.¹ As part of the Bullshit Detection part of a module last semester, we were given the research paper, told to critically analyse it and subsequently produce a leaflet for GPs that would enable to them to answer patient’s questions regarding what they may have read about in the news. This is the leaflet I made and got quite decent(ish) marks for:

Click here to download (PDF 815kb)

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Picture 1 – Showing cadavers, taken from here.
Picture 2 – Showing supposed myths about cancer, taken from here.
Picture 3 – Showing leaflet front, from personal work.
¹The original research paper can be downloaded from here.

I sat down, scattered my lecture notes all over the table looking for the ones on ‘Immune cell-cell interaction at the molecular level’, took my laptop out of my bag and turned it on ready to do some work. When it finally booted up, I smiled when I saw the post-it notes on my desktop:

(Click on the picture to enlarge and read the big green post-it)

The smiling didn’t last very long, when I realised I was now officially 21. TWENTY-ONE! But before my mind starts wandering down the ‘OMG you’re getting old’ path, I’m going to start making those notes I was going to. Plus, I have a lot of other work to do as well, just take a look at the other post-its. And their cheekiness, I have to buy 3 twirls now. 8-)

And thank you to all you lubbbbbly jubbbbly people who have sent me cards and messages and mails already! <3

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Title: City of blinding lights – U2
Screenshot showing desktop – Personal photography

I was going through my photos that are stored away in the hard-drive of memories. Dad brought this hard-drive a few years ago, solely for the purpose of storing photos and videos of the family. I came across this photo:

This photo I took myself, many years ago. I think it was the beginning of high school; year 7 or 8. On that day there was a blackout in our area, which is quite a rare occurrence here. It’s the only time I can remember it ever happening to be honest. While the house was flooded in darkness, I remember mum walking to the kitchen and fetching some candles a friend of hers had given as a gift a few days before. She gave me one too, so that I could continue doing my homework (I was a good little boy back then). Now that I think of the incident, I am made to realise that sometimes you need a little darkness to see the light.

*****

I’m also quite a lot behind on blog reading and replying to comments. Sorry guys, I haven’t forgotten you. I’ll get round to that ASAP.

[This is a scheduled post]

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Title: Bowl of oranges – Bright Eyes
Photograph showing flame – Personal photography

This is the story of my life,
And I write it everyday
I know it isn’t black and white
And it’s anything but grey
I know that no I’m not alright, but I feel okay ‘cos
Anything can, everything can happen
That’s the story of my life…

I’m gonna write the melody
That’s gonna make history,
And when I paint my masterpiece I swear I’ll show you first
There just ain’t a way to see who and why or what will be
Till now is then
It’s a mystery, it’s a blessing and a curse
Or something worse

This is the story of my life
And I write it everyday,
And I hope you’re by my side when I’m writing the last page.¹

The lyrics of the song posted above, is one that I first heard a very long time ago with a very special person. Though that person is no longer here, this song still reminds me of her and the promises we made together. However this post is not one about Charley, but about life. That same life, which like a credit card that is topped every midnight to a balance of 86,400, many of us forget to exploit to it's full potential. Just stop reading for a minute, and think about it. If you were told you would be given a total of £86,400 to spend each day in whatever way you liked what would you do? At the end of each day however, any money left unspent would be discarded and you would not be able to transfer it to the next day. Would anyone in their right mind let any of that money go? You could use that money to spoil yourself and others, give to those in need, fulfil your dreams and the list goes on and on and on. It’s the same with life. There are 24 hours in a day, 60 minutes in an hour, and 60 seconds in each and every minute. That’s a total of 86,400 seconds, which once gone will never come back. What have you done with your balance? Many of us are guilty of not living, but merely existing.

That is not to say that when we are overcome by difficulties, hardships, grief or run out of breath we don’t stop and take a Time-Out. The one that has never experienced suffering never lived and the one having suffered was unable to find happiness never learned.² Sometimes you don’t want to go on, sometimes you’re so tired, exhausted and worn-out by trying to live that you just wish to stop. Like my lovely friend Marshmallow said to me:

It’s okay to say, “I wanna stay in bed today, I’m taking a day off”. Let someone else carry your burdens for you for a day, just like you carried theirs.

It’s okay to hurt and to cry, but it’s stupidity when that same hurt, whether it be due to the breakup of a relationship, loss of a job or the death of a loved one for example, steals your life and makes you dead. The world unfortunately goes on, and unless you jump back on the ride, you’ll get left behind.

Those that sow in tears, reap in joy.³

*****

Fear not when, fear not why,
Fear not much while were alive,
Life is for living not living up tight,
See ya somewhere up in the sky,
Fear not die, I'll be alive for a million years, bye bye…⁴

Conditions of accepting award:

1. Thank and put a link back to the person who so kindly gave this award.
2. Share a few things about yourself.
3. Pass the award onto some mighty fine bloggers.
4. Inform these mighty fine bloggers that they have received the award.

Here goes:

1. I was totally humbled and honoured to receive this award, given to me by the amazing Gary (@Klahanie). If you have forgotten the worth of living, or have realised that you just do not know how good it is to be alive, then I would tell you to read (not recommend) Gary’s blog. Each and every post is written with such honesty, emotion and thought that it is bound to leave a mark on each and every reader. Each and every word written is so beautiful, that it is poetical. Thank you ever so much.
2. This is the first hardest thing I find…
   1. My brother has started calling me ‘red nose reindeer’ as I have a spot on my nose. It’s bright red because of all the poking I’ve been doing to it (any help?).
   2. I appreciate and really value the simple things in life; family, friends, memories, moments and coffee dates for example.
   3. Whenever starting on a project, I always go for the designing first. The writing comes later. If it doesn’t look good, who’s gonna read it?
   4. I suck at remembering in general - names, dates, names of diseases and drugs, the list is endless. If I forget your birthday, forgive me!
   5. I’m not married but I celebrate anniversaries.
   6. If you gave me a jar of green olives, NOM NOM NOM, and you’ll have no idea where it went. They are from heaven.
   7. I want to be a paediatric surgeon one day insha’Allah. But I wouldn’t mind being a teacher.
   8. If you have a packet of cookies, you can bribe me to do pretty much anything (nearly).
   9. I don’t know why I am still making this list, it has taken me 20 minutes just to write the last 8 facts.
3. This is the second hardest thing I find…
   1. Ella Unread (From the STUPIDEST corner of my mind)  is a blogger that I recently discovered. Though I haven’t read much of her writing, but from the little I have read of her poems, I have to say they are beautiful. You may read one of her poems and nod your head in agreement because they are just so…human.
   2. Kamila’s blog (Basket of Dreams), is full of sugar and spice and all things nice. She writes about so many different things I don’t where to start. But one thing is true, after reading her blog you’ll want to do some of the ideas she proposes because they are just so cool!
   3. Apart from the fact that AcetylCholine (Critical Velocity) is a bad influence on me Martian (I think ), she writes about everything and nothing from the umpteen number of Ipod headphones she’s been through, or more recently how cytochrome bc1 complex lead to the invention of a cuss word. Her style makes it worth reading.
   4. Gelovsky (GELOVSKY ^_^) is an optimist, sarcastic and fantastic who is another blogger I have recently started following.
   5. Pooja (Just Breathe) is honest, straight up and living life to the full. No beating around the bush one may say, and that is why I think she is deserving of this award. Keep, smiling, keep eating the Gulab Jamuns⁵ and keep living!
   6. The person with no name an undisclosed name (TheraScribbles) suffers from depression and started writing as a way of helping. The blog is extremely thought provoking, eye-opening and inspiring.
   7. Hijabi Hippie Hypo (Hijabi Hippie Hypo & Overcoming Obstacles) hasn’t written for a very long time and so I hope this gives her reason to change that. Her blog is always a pleasure to read, full of pictures, drawings, book and film reviews; there’s always something new to keep you interested.
   8. Leah’s (My Tasty Treasures) blog is tasty and one of the major reasons why is because it requires the reader to think, and asks questions. There are lots of pretty pictures coupled with wonderful bits of prose.
   9. Furree Katt (The Jackky Bhagnani Obsession) deserves this award because I once gave her an award that she gave to me. That’s like someone giving you a gift and you giving it back to them, which is not very nice. And so to make up for it, I’m giving her this, for her passionate, interesting and funny writing.

Have a lovely weekend everyone. :)

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Title: Story of my life – Bon Jovi
¹Lyrics from the same song as the title
²For your story, Part 2 – page 8. 
³Psalms 126:5
⁴Young Forever – Jay Z feat. Mr Hudson
⁵Gulab Jamun – A popular sweet eaten in the subcontinent.

I have a book at home titled, “What we believe but cannot prove”. It contains the responses of various scientists, journalists and other thinkers when they were asked the following question:

“What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove?”

(click the image above to visit the amazon page)

I sat down and thought about it for a while. I believe there is life out there, beyond our world which is our niche in the universe, beyond the vast stretches of stars and other celestial bodies. Maybe not necessarily intelligent life as portrayed by Hollywood but something nonetheless.

What about you? What do you believe in, that you cannot prove?

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Title: We are the people – Feeder
Picture of book cover taken from amazon (click on the image, or here to visit amazon page)