Skin Thermoreceptors

The integumentary system is composed of the skin, its major organ, and accessory organs including hair, nails, oil and sweat glands. The system serves many purposes with its most important being that it is your body’s first line of defense against pathogens. The integumentary system has other functions including the regulation of body temperature, production of Vitamin D, providing a natural sunscreen, storing fatty tissue for energy and providing sensory input (In-class discussion). There are many pathologies that can affect the integumentary system, one of which, is Lyme disease.

A major function of melanin is to act as a defensive barrier of the skin against radiation damage. Ultraviolet light between the wavelengths 280-320nm (UV-B) causes sunburn and damages the skin on nonpigmented peoples. Exposure to this degree of light causes their skin to become dry, leathery, and wrinkled in appearance similar to that associated with aging. This can be seen in Whites living in Australia and South Africa, where ultraviolet light intensity is high because of the relative latitude or closeness to the equator.

Human beings are no exception to biological evolution. Like other organisms around the world, humans have significantly changed overtime and have developed all sorts of diverse characteristics. One noticeable characteristic of human beings is the variation of skin

1. Sweat glands are also known as _SUDORIFEROUS__ glands. One type, called _MEROCLINE_ glands, serve for evaporative cooling of the body, while the other type, called _APOCRINE glands, are scent glands. One place where the latter type can be found is the _AXILLARY_region.

The Integumentary is a vast organ system composed of exocrine glands, hair, nails, and the most commonly known organ, the skin. As a large system, it can be susceptible to many different types of diseases, one of these diseases are called Psoriasis. This affects a large portion of the Integumentary system, the skin. Psoriasis are considered to be a widespread, common and recurring disease that can be chronic at times. Psoriasis are defined by its appearance of light silver in color, flaky, rash on many parts of the Epidermis.

The Integumentary system is defined as “an organ system consisting in the skin, hair, nails, and exocrine glands” (Integumentary System, 1999). This systems main purpose is to protect the body from the environment around it. The skin covers and protects tissues, nerves, veins, and muscles of the body. The hair and nails give extra strength in reinforcing the skin while keeping the body warm and protecting the skin from harmful UV rays. The exocrine glands of the skin include the sudoriferous glands, sebaceous glands, and the ceruminous glands. Each exocrine gland has a different function as well as location in the skin. The following text will explain the effects of melanoma on the integumentary system.

An example of an area would be in the European areas, where the UV radiation doesn’t beam down as strong onto our skin. If it was another hot open area such as Australia then the skin pigmentation stayed darker. In short, the skin pigmentation adapted to the lifestyle and the surround environment to better help survive in that climate. This is due to the body producing more melanin so the effects of the sun’s rays can be counteracted. Through generations successful genes are passed through the blood line, the human body also has a tendency to produce a particular amount of melanin depending on the location of where one

     There are three main types of skin cancer. These are malignant melanoma, basal cell carcinoma, and squamous cell carcinoma. While melanoma is the most life-threatening of the three, it is also the most

The basic function of sensory receptors is to respond to environmental stimuli and convert them into action potentials. The different types of receptors are: photoreceptors (respond to light), chemoreceptors (respond to chemicals), thermoreceptors (respond to temperature), pain receptors (respond to pain), and mechanoreceptors (all receptors that respond to mechanical energy, such as touch, pressure, stretch, hearing and balance).

Exposure to abnormally high frequencies of light can potentially alter the DNA of a cell and turn it cancerous, the resulting cancerous cells are known as skin cancer. The most common cause is ultraviolet light emitted by the sun although it has been known to be caused by tanning booths, unusually high levels of x-rays, exposure to some chemicals and in rare cases the abnormal genes that cause skin cancer can be inherited by children from their parents.

The second most common skin cancer happens to be squamous cell carcinoma. This skin cancer is a rough surfaced skin colored lesion and it can most likely cause death in about 10 percent of patients that are affected with this disease. Last but not least, the most serious skin cancer is melanoma, which often looks like a dark, changing, bleeding skin spot. Melanoma is fatal in as many as 35 percent of patients who are diagnosed with this form of skin cancer. The skin cancer that interested me the most was basal cell carcinoma because I wanted to figure out why it was the most common skin cancer.

When this happens water seeps into your epithelial cells, causing them to swell up, and your skins gets red and puffy. Do you know how some people have dark skin, and some have white skin? It's from the pigments in your epithelial cells. The two main pigments that affect the color of our skin are melanin and carotene. There are two types of melanin. Most people have dark brown melanin, which gives your skin a brown, olive, or black color, but some people have red-orange melanin and they usually have red hair, and a lot of freckles. Melanin is produced by cells deep in your epidermis called melanocytes. All of us have the same amount of melanocytes, but the color of our skin is determined by how much melanin your melanocytes make, which is controlled by your DNA. When you're in the sun for awhile, your body starts generating more melanin, and can sometimes result in a freckle. A freckle is

Scientists do not fully understand Vitiligo yet; they are still trying to find out why it occurs. Evidence points towards the conclusion that it is an autoimmune disorder, in which the body’s immune system mistakenly targets the melanocytes in your body. The changes in the skin can vary from patient to patient, being that

Dermatitis is a general term that describes an inflammation of the skin. There are different types of dermatitis, including seborrheic dermatitis and atopic dermatitis (eczema). Although the disorder can have many causes and occur in many forms, it usually involves swollen, reddened and itchy skin. (www.umm.edu/altmed/articles/dermatitis-000048.htm)

Squamous cell carcinoma is second most common type of skin cancer, after basal cell carcinoma. Squamous cell cancer spreads faster than basal cell cancer, but still is usually relatively slow-growing. It can spread (metastasize) to other locations, including internal organs.