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Animals like bighorn sheep and woodpeckers hit their heads many times a day but do not get concussions or even seem to get a headache...
Animals like bighorn sheep and woodpeckers hit their heads many times a day but do not get concussions or even seem to get a headache...
- Both bighorn sheep and woodpeckers have natural mechanisms that slow the return of blood from the head to the body.
- This increases the brain’s vascular tree, creating the “bubble wrap effect.”
- A study by Cincinnati Children's Hospital noted that there are less concussions at higher altitudes.
- Brain slosh, or the brain jiggling within the skull, is the most common cause of concussions in football.
- Because the brain does not fit tightly within the skull, when a player's head rapidly accelerates, his brain is at risk of a brain slosh.
- They hypothesized that there is an increased amount of blood passing through the arteries, veins, and brain in high altitudes. This makes the room for the brain to move within the skull less, creating the bubble wrap effect.
- Bighorn sheep use hollow pneumatic horn cores that allow them to rebreathe its air and increase the carbon dioxide in its bloodstream, increasing the vascular tree.
The small volume of the woodpecker’s cranial space and the smooth surface area of the brain helps prevent neurological trauma
The small volume of the woodpecker’s cranial space and the smooth surface area of the brain helps prevent neurological trauma
- Similar to mammals, bird skulls contain a space between the brain’s grey matter and the skull’s vascular tissue called the subarachnoid cavity
- The subarachnoid cavity has cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) that provides cushioning from minor bumps. However, this space allows the brain to move excessively under strong vibrations or blows, like those experienced by woodpeckers and football players.
- Woodpeckers have proportionally less CSF than other birds, an adaptation to protect its brain during drumming.
- Less CSF prevents brain injury in 2 ways:
- Decreased volume makes it more difficult for the brain to be moved if the head is struck
- With decreased CSF volume, there is less medium for stress force to transmit through, therefore reducing the impact on neural tissue.
- The surface area of the woodpecker’s brain is smooth. If the brain is struck, the impact is more evenly transmitted around the brain, rather than hitting one point with a greater amount of force.
Species with complex brains have many ridges on their brains. If struck, the site of the impact receives a greater amount of force.
In smoother brained species, the force is more evenly distributed.
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