What Is The Feedback Mechanisms Of Homeostasis

1. Background information about homeostasis:

Homeostasis is the maintenance of a relatively constant internal environment within small tolerance limits, despite changes in the external environment. Homeostasis uses feedback mechanisms within the body to either counteract (negative feedback) or reinforce (positive feedback) a stimulus. These feedback mechanisms help to keep many internal functions such as enzyme pH, pressure and temperature within narrow limits known as the tolerance range. The tolerance is the range in which an organism can function and reproduce. Physiological stress occurs when a function goes outside this tolerance range. Metabolism is a vital part of homeostasis as it can help increase or decrease internal body temperature,

Interpret your results and observations:

As noted in question two on page four, the air temperature made a relatively significant impact on the subject’s readings when comparing attempt one and two. The 1.5°C temperature increase during attempt two increased the subject’s initial skin temperature by 2.3°C and their core temperature by 1.5°C. This had a flow on effect, causing the subject to have an elevated heart rate during the first four minutes of exercise. This increase in bpm was most likely due to increased stress placed on the subject’s cardiovascular system to replace electrolytes lost to sweat via the bloodstream.

The decrease in core temperature during both attempts was contradictory to the hypothesis, which stated that there would be an increase in core temperature. This created an anomaly because the subject’s core temperature should have risen due to excess heat produced by cellular respiration. The most likely reasons for the recorded drop in core temperature include the inaccuracy of the infrared thermometer to record internal temperatures consistently and the cooling effect of sweat may have produced a lower reading than expected when using the infrared