 The Bones
Like Yodels—they’re hard on the outside, soft in the middle.
Lowdown:
You’re born with 300 bones. By the time you’re an adult, some have
fused together, so now you’ve got 206, assuming you haven’t tangled
with any wood-chippers. Bones do more than hold up all your skin and
guts. Inside is a soft center—marrow, which produces red and white
blood cells.
Cutting edge:
Researchers at McGill University in Montreal have created a way to
make artificial human bones using…an ink-jet printer. Let’s say you
show up in the ER with a crushed right leg. Doctors take a 3d MRI of
the uninjured bone in your left leg, then scan it into the printer. The
machine then creates a 3-D object using a cementlike powder and coats
it with phosphoric acid. (Phosphorous is one of the main components of
human bone.) The result: a replacement bone. “Traditionally, doctors
repair a missing bone with bits of the patient’s own transplanted bone,
which is painful, or from a cadaver, which is often rejected by your
body,” explains inventor Jake Barralet, professor of dentistry at
McGill. “But since this new technology mimics your own bone’s shape,
structure and material, the thought is your body will accept it and
healing times can be shortened.” The procedure could be widely
available within the next five years.
How breakable are bones?
It ain’t easy busting a bone. The impact on the bones in your knee as
you walk, for example, equals seven times your body weight, says Dr.
Vonda Wright of the University of Pittsburgh. When force is applied across the
bone instead of lengthwise, that’s when the suckers break. Think of
that famous Joe Theisman ankle holocaust. “Depending on how the blow
lands,” says Dr. Michael Pearl of the American Academy of Orthopaedic
Surgeons, “the pressure doesn’t have to be all that great.” Snap.
Health plan:
Yeah, yeah—calcium, protein, multivitamins. Here’s another tip: “Every
time you jump, the fluid in your bone moves, signaling the cells to
build more bone,” says Dr. Pamela Hinton of the University of Missouri.
Aim for three medium-impact exercise sessions a week. Or blow it off
and buy an ink-jet printer.
 The Guts
Check ’em out, if you have the intestinal fortitude.
Lowdown:
Your high school coach told you that guts are what it takes to win
football games. Technically speaking, however, the intestines and other
associated innards support “everything involving the ingestion,
digestion, and rejection of food,” says Dr. Patricia Raymond of
Eastern Virginia Medical School. They’re also the source of some
amazing and slightly repulsive trivia: 22 feet: length of the garden-hose-diameter small intestine if untangled; 48 inches: length of the firehose-diameter large intestine (a.k.a. the colon); 10 to 20 times a day: “normal” rate for humans to pass gas (unless you’re an elevator operator). Bonus fact:
The tubes of the gastrointestinal tract are like interchangeable
plumbing pipes. If surgeons had to remove a portion of your esophagus,
a piece of colon can replace it. Eww.
The cutting edge: Does the word colonoscopy make you squirm? In the not-so-distant future, the
rectum-poking
procedure might be replaced by advanced capsule endoscopy, in which the
patient simply swallows a tiny wireless probe that takes digital images
of the bowel. “Technology companies are even working on capsules that
can be remotely navigated to conduct biopsies and treat ulcers and
tumors to avoid invasive surgery,” says Dr. Mark Sapienza, a
gastroenterologist at New Jersey’s Englewood Hospital. Sorry,
colonoscopy fans. You’ll have to get your action elsewhere.
The Package
An up-close look into your underwear.
Lowdown:
Your reproductive organ is the love of your life. It’ll never leave you
(let’s hope), and, like a woman, despite its ups and downs, it’s still
incredibly fun to spend quality time with. The creation of sexual
dysfunction drugs—Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra—has spurred a remarkable
wave of scientific research into the function of the male reproductive
system. This proves two things: The desire for sexual gratification
will always be an impetus for innovation. And pharmaceutical company
executives will crawl until their fingers bleed after the next big
payday. By the way, your suspicions were correct: Ron Jeremy is a freak
of nature. The average penis length is about 3.75 inches and six inches
erect.
Cutting edge: All the
latest research is focused on finding a sexual dysfunction pill that
won’t have side effects (seeing blue, headaches, those pesky 48-hour
hard-ons—call your doctor if you grow a vagina). All three pills
mentioned above employ the same basic mechanism; they relax the muscles
around the blood vessels in the penis, allowing more blood to flow.
What’ll work better is anyone’s guess. The holy grail? It’s no secret—a
Viagra that’ll work on women.
Health plan:
The first step to keeping your gun properly loaded is to “never, ever
buy any pill or potion hyped on the Internet to increase size,” says
Palo Alto, California sex therapist Marty Klein, Ph.D. “They’re all
frauds.” Instead, consider this: Everything that helps prevent heart
disease helps your sex organ function properly, explains Fair Oaks,
California sex therapist Louanne Weston, Ph.D. Flaccid or erect, penis
size and health depend on the amount of blood flowing through it. That
means don’t smoke, eat a low-fat diet, exercise, and keep your gut from
hanging over. “When you have a big belly,” says Bloomfield Hills,
Michigan psychologist and sex therapist Dennis Sugrue Ph.D., “fat
encroaches on the base of your penis, making it look smaller,”
resulting in it’s-in-there-somewhere syndrome. Meanwhile, the debate
over surgical enhancement of the penis has the medical community
enraged. Some 20,000 patients have gone under the knife;
today the
surgery costs between $8,000 and $10,000. There are dozens of lawsuits
pending over botched jobs, leaving the poor guys in John Wayne
Bobbit–like purgatory. Go forward at your own risk.
 The Liver
It ain’t pretty, but it’s your best friend in a toxic world.
Lowdown:
At three pounds, the liver is the largest internal organ, composed of
two lobes the size and shape of a catcher’s mitt, which palm the
stomach. Unlike other organs, this bad boy can regenerate, much like
Hayden Panettiere on Heroes but not nearly as cute. Cut out 60
percent—for donation or to pair with a silky Chianti—and it’ll regrow
itself. The liver is the body’s “factory, recycling center, and storage
facility,” says Dr. James R. Burton Jr., assistant professor of
medicine at the University of Colorado. It makes cholesterol, the gook
that keeps cell walls healthy. It recycles your blood, filtering it
through and pulling out the toxins like a sieve. And then it takes all
the garbage, breaks it down, and routes it to your kidneys so you can
piss it out.
Health plan:
You know the story: Don’t drink too much. But keep in mind, your liver
is one tough hunk of disgusting-looking flesh. It’s likely to handle
all the abuse you can give it. One common practice it doesn’t like,
however, is the hangover Tylenol. Beat back a morning headache with
this drug—the liver’s nemesis—and you’ll really feel the pain. “If
you’re a chronic alcohol drinker,” says Dr. Sanjiv Chopra, dean for
continuing education at Harvard Medical School, “taking just six Extra
Strength Tylenol at one time can destroy your liver.”
Cutting edge:
The bad news is that the obesity epidemic is both ruining livers and
decreasing the supply of healthy livers for transplant.The operation is
not a pleasant procedure; the late Evel Knievel (who knows a thing or
two about pain) compared getting his liver transplanted to “replacing a
football in your stomach.” The good news is that pork isn’t just for
barbecuing any more. God-like doctors are genetically modifying pigs so
that their livers won’t be rejected by picky human bodies during
cross-species transplantation, and trying to make the pig livers
produce more human-like proteins for continued function. The next
hurdle: Convincing transplant recipients to keep their filthy rooms
clean.
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