… How it look says a lot about your health
Enyeribe Ejiogu
The tongue is a very unique organ in the body, which is domiciled in the mouth. It is a specialized muscle with different parts and plays major roles in life. A number of vital body functions would not happen without the tongue.
As the health blog, medicine.net notes, “we use our tongues all the time to eat, talk, and swallow.” Without the numerous taste buds on the surface of the tongue, food just wouldn’t be the same without a working tongue, but have you ever thought about how this amazing organ does what it does? Knowing what the tongue does, how it works and how vulnerable it can be in certain situations you would naturally and wisely want to protect it from harm and by extension preserve your own life. The tongue and taste buds on it play an important role in overall health of the body. Below is a snap shot of interesting facts about the tongue.
The average tongue is about 3 inches long
Tongues are measured from the epiglottis (a flap of cartilage in the mouth at the back of the tongue) to the tip. An adult man’s average tongue length is 3.3 inches (8.5 cm), and an adult woman’s average tongue length is 3.1 inches (7.9 cm).
According to the Guinness World Records, the current title of World’s Longest Tongue belongs to an American named Nick Stoeberl, whose tongue measures 3.97 inches (10.1 cm).
The tongue has between 2,000 and 4,000 taste buds
The average adult has between 2,000 to 4,000 taste buds in total. The sensory cells in the taste buds are responsible for how we recognize the taste of food, liquids, fruits, juices, drugs as well as certain body fluids. Taste buds have ability to renew themselves every week.
About one-quarter of the population is considered “supertasters,” people with a heightened sense of taste, particularly for bitter foods and specifically a bitter compound called 6-n-propylthiouracil (PROP). Another quarter is considered “non-tasters,” who fortunately can taste foods, but are less sensitive and cannot detect the bitter taste of PROP.
Taste buds not visible to the human eye. Those little pink and white bumps you do see on your tongue are actually called papillae, hair-like projections that taste buds rest atop. Each has an average of six taste buds buried inside its surface tissue. It these sensory nerve cells that are responsible for the sense of taste.
Taste buds occur in other places besides tongue
Most taste buds are on the tongue, but there are also taste cells in the back of the throat, on the epiglottis (which is the flap of cartilage in the mouth at the back of the tongue), the nose and sinuses, all the way down the throat to the upper part of the esophagus. Infants and young children have even more cells that sense taste in the mucous membranes of their lips and cheeks. All these cells send signals to the brain that are converted into what we perceive as taste.
The tongue is not a single muscle, but a group of muscles.
You don’t sense different tastes in different areas of the tongue
We grew up believing the tongue had four taste zones: one each for sweet, sour, salty, and bitter, but this is not the case. These tastes, along with a fifth taste called umami (savoury), can be sensed on all parts of the tongue. The sides of the tongue are more sensitive overall than the middle, and the back of our tongue is more sensitive to bitter tastes.
The tongue is not the strongest muscle in your body
The tongue is all muscle, but not just one muscle – it’s made up of 8 different muscles that intertwine with each other creating a flexible matrix, much like an elephant’s trunk. It’s called a muscular hydrostat, and the tongue muscles are the only muscles in the human body that work independently of the skeleton. Your tongue muscles do have amazing stamina and are used constantly for eating, talking, and swallowing. The tongue just never seems to get tired!
Taste buds are designed to keep us alive.
Taste buds have helped the human race to evolve. In the beginning, the sense of taste helped us test the foods we ate: bitter and sour tastes might indicate poisonous plants or rotting foods. The back of our tongue is sensitive to bitter tastes so we can spit out poisonous or spoiled foods before we swallow them. Sweet and salty tastes let us know foods were rich in nutrients.
Your tongue can get fat
If you get fat, so does your tongue! The human tongue has a high percentage of fat, and there is a correlation between tongue fat volume and obesity. A study in the journal, Sleep, showed that having a larger tongue with higher levels of fat might be a risk factor for obstructive sleep apnea (a serious sleep disorder in which a person repeatedly stops and starts breathing while sleeping) in obese adults.
Your tongue print is as unique as a fingerprint
Yes, the tongue of each individual is unique just like the fingerprint. Scientific researchers are seeing potentials in the tongue being used as an identity verification tool. The tongue is protected in the mouth and would be difficult to forge, and a person can stick it out for examination. Researchers are already working on ways to use the tongue as a biometric authenticator – a reliable way to positively identify a person.
Your tongue can say a lot about your health
Your tongue can actually provide clues about the overall health of the body. For instance, a bright red tongue may be a sign of folic acid or B12 deficiency, scarlet fever, or Kawasaki disease (a serious condition seen in children)
White spots or a white coating on the tongue could indicate oral thrush (a type of yeast infection), or leukoplakia (which can be a precursor to cancer). A black, hairy tongue can be a sign of bacterial overgrowth, and can also occur in people with diabetes or those on antibiotics or chemotherapy
Painful bumps on the tongue may be canker sores (mouth ulcers), or oral cancer.
If you have any symptoms or concerns about the appearance of your tongue, see your doctor.