Thermoregulation Activity/Experiment

[Mr Rayon]

Introduction

Any organism whose temperature alters very little, despite variations in the surrounding temperature, must have mechanisms that are regulating its body temperature. Under normal circumstances, humans maintain a body core temperature in the range of 36.1°C to 37.8°C. When the core temperature is in this range, it provides the optimum conditions for the body to functions. External factors, infection or exercise can cause the body to make changes to regulate its core temperature. And these responses may be physiological or behavioural.

 

Purpose

To investigate the responses of the human body to extremes of ambient temperature.

 

Materials

Each group will require:

-oral thermometer

-skin thermometer

-alcohol swabs

-buckets/tubs

-hot and cold water

-ice cubes

-spray bottle

-stopwatch

-electric fan

-heater

-sleeping bag

-bathing suit

-hat, scarf and gloves

 

Procedure

-Read the procedure and formulate an hypothesis about the effect that extremes in ambient temperature (after 20-minute exposure) will have on core temperature (as measured by an oral thermometer) and skin temperature in humans. Complete this section of data sheet 1.

-Identify the variable, control and the factors that will be kept constant. The experimental procedure whould take no longer than 30 minutes.

-Work in groups of 3 or 4. Stop if the subject/s feel unwell at any time.

 

Cold subjects:

-Record skin and core temperatures of the subject before you begin (Table 4.1).

-Make the subeject/s as cold as possible by:

 

-wearing bathers

-placing in a cold breezeway

-placing feet in buckets of icy water

-exposing the body to ice from a spray bottle containing icy water

 

Hot subjects:

-Record skin and core temperatures of the subject before you begin (Table 4.1).

-Make the subject/s as hot as possible by:

 

-wrapping in a sleeping bag

-wearing a hat, scarf and gloves

-sitting in front of a heater

-For both cold and hot subjects, record the core and skin temperature every 2 minutes, as well as any other observations (Table 4.1)

-Record the class results

 

Results

 

Data Sheet 1

 

2) Identify the:

 

 

a) variable: I'm guessing this would be temperature.b) control (explain how it will be used): I'm not sure what the control is here. We had only two groups. Two people from each group were put into conditions of extreme cold or warm external environment.

c) constants:

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Well, the above is what's written in the sheet of the practical part of a SAC that my school did for biology. I have used the red colour to indicate the parts that are not typed in my practical sheet, and are just my thoughts. Any way in the above what would be the control and constants? Can someone clarify if temperature would be the variable? I think we were suppose to go through this in class but my teacher forgot. What's typed here as well as the next page (not shown here) will be brought to school as reference material for my SAC on Monday. We are also allowed to bring one A4 sheet of notes as a cheat sheet.

 

Any thoughts on the questions above will be appreciated!

[GDG]

Your control in this case is probably the baseline temperature readings of the subjects, before treatment. Technically, a control group would not be exposed to any change in temperature over time, and you would then see how much their body temps varied (in the absence of environmental variation).