Week 6

Hello again folks! We were not required to make a blog last week, thus I took a break. This week we did a lab that I would like to tell you about. We found out our blood types! Yup, we had to poke ourselves (with sterile glucose checking monitor thingies) and run tests. Let me tell you more about this lab. The first part of the lab required us to figure out our blood types. We were to observe how the blood reacted to the reagents and identify any clotting. The second part of our lab was to locate and try to manipulate the heartbeat of a fish. This lab pertained to the circulatory system or the cardiovascular system. The both parts of the lab had to do with blood which is a major part of the circulatory system. The circulatory system is “the system that circulates blood and lymph through the body, consisting of the heart, blood vessels, blood, lymph, and the lymphatic vessels and glands (Oxford Dictionary)”. The circulatory system is very important for life to be sustained. It is important to know how that system can be repaired or damaged. The labs we did dealt with those variables that could either hurt or help the circulatory system. The first part of the lab sought to identify our blood types, thus identifying the blood type we could need in case of a transfusion. The second part used fish to show how certain substances can dramatically increase the blood flow and heartbeat. Too much of an increase can cause cardiac arrest. So, as you can see this lab was very practical. My group used Redbull and nicotine as our substances. You could see the sudden, dramatic increase in the activity of the fish. I hope you learned something! Bye