Sweat is also known as perspiration say: pur-spuh-RAY-shun , and it is made almost completely of water, with tiny amounts of other chemicals like ammonia say: uh-MOWN-yuh , urea say: yoo-REE-uh , salts, and sugar. Ammonia and urea are left over when your body breaks down protein. The sweat leaves your skin through tiny holes called pores. When the sweat hits the air, the air makes it evaporate this means it turns from a liquid to a vapor.
As the sweat evaporates off your skin, you cool down. Sweat is a great cooling system, but if you're sweating a lot on a hot day or after playing hard you could be losing too much water through your skin. Then you need to put liquid back in your body by drinking plenty of water so you won't get dehydrated say: dee-HI-drayt-ed.
Also called perspiration, sweating is the release of a salt-based fluid from your sweat glands. Changes in your body temperature, the outside temperature, or your emotional state can cause sweating. The most common areas of sweating on the body include:. Not sweating enough and sweating too much can both cause problems. The absence of sweat can be dangerous because your risk of overheating increases.
Excessive sweating may be more psychologically damaging than physically damaging. Your body is equipped with an average of three million sweat glands. There are two types of sweat glands: eccrine and apocrine. The eccrine sweat glands are located all over your body and produce a lightweight, odorless sweat.
The apocrine sweat glands are concentrated in the hair follicles of the following parts of your body:. These glands release a heavier, fat-laden sweat that carries a distinct odor. The smell, referred to as body odor, occurs when apocrine sweat breaks down and mixes with the bacteria on your skin.
Your autonomic nervous system controls your sweating function. This is the part of your nervous system that functions on its own, without your conscious control. When the weather is hot or your body temperature rises due to exercise or fever, sweat is released through ducts in your skin. It moistens the surface of your body and cools you down as it evaporates. For instance, there could be nerve damage. Conditions that can lead to this type of nerve damage include diabetes, alcoholism, Parkinson's disease or direct damage to the skin, such as after trauma, said Bauer.
Sometimes skin diseases, such as psoriasis or heat rash, can interfere with normal sweat gland functioning, as well. Conditions called hypohidrotic ectodermal dysplasia and hypohidrosis, also known as anhidrosis, can also cause the sweat glands to malfunction. Menopause can lead to the sensation of feeling hot or having episodes of "hot flashes" without associated sweating, as well, said Pathak.
A person who is not hot, but is still sweating, may have a problem with their sympathetic nervous system. Hyperhidrosis is a skin condition where the body sweats more than what is required to keep cool because of overactive sweat glands.
It can affect the underarms axillary hyperhidrosis , palms of the hands, soles of the feet and face, according to the Mayo Clinic. If the heavy sweating is accompanied by chest pain, lightheadedness, chills, nausea or a body temperature of F 40 C or higher, seek immediate medical assistance. These techniques are being used to develop power sources for wearable electronic devices.
Their work shows that human sweat can be used as a biofuel! Fortunately, your body has very sophisticated mechanisms for sensing and regulating body temperature. As soon as your body's internal temperature starts rising, your hypothalamus a small region in your brain tells eccrine sweat glands distributed all over your body that it's time to start cooling you down by producing sweat.
Cooling down, however, isn't as easy as this sweat just dripping off of you. Some of this sweat has to evaporate off of your skin for this process to actually work. That's because cooling your body via sweating relies on a principle of physics called "heat of vaporization. It takes energy to evaporate sweat off of your skin, and that energy is heat.
As your excess body heat is used to convert beads of sweat into vapor, you start to cool down. The other trade off here, though, is that you also lose water as you sweat — and water is critically important for just about every organ in your body. This means that when you're sweating, you also need to make sure you're drinking plenty of water so you can replace the water you lose with water you can use.
All this to say, releasing heat through beads of sweat that can easily evaporate off the skin is a very effective way of cooling your body down. By contrast, your dog releases heat by panting — which isn't nearly as effective as sweating.
Whether it's your first day of work, a first date or a stressfully close sporting event , I'm sure we've all experienced the sweaty palms and underarms that come along with being stressed, scared or nervous. What you may not realize, however, is that this "emotional sweating" isn't quite the same as cooling sweat.
It happens for a different reason, and it's primarily associated with a different type of sweat gland altogether.
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