Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Got Science?

http://www.howstuffworks.com/question100.htm
http://www.ehow.com/facts_5729847_human-vs_-monkey-hair.html

How do Monkeys keep their hair short?

For those of you who didn't get the question, this was a tricky one.  The trick behind the tricky question was that you had to search not monkey hair shortness, but why hair grows to a certain length in general.  (and by all means, you definitely shouldn't have searched for monkey barbershops- that would have gotten you nowhere).  Basically, as Totalmystery and Saffire said, monkeys shed (and we do too).  To be a little more detailed, the parts of your body that grows hair, your hair follicles, have a specific programming, so to speak.  Every hair, first of all, has its own follicle, so this follicle produces new hair cells, pushing the older ones, which we see as hair.  Hair follicles will continue to produce cells for a certain period of time, called the growth period.  Then, the follicles will stop, which is called the rest period.  Once a hair follicle enters this rest period, it stops growing and the hair falls out- thus, once the rest period ends, the follicle can start anew.  This system of grow-rest-grow-rest controls how long hair can grow, so while the hair on your head can grow long enough to cover your face, the hair on your arms won't do much.  Animals that shed coordinate this rest period so that all their hair sheds at the same time, creating a mess in your house at times.  So, monkeys keep their hair short simply because it isn't going to grow any longer (for monkeys with short hair). And that's it for today! Hope you learned something!

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