Social Media and You






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Have you ever heard of the websites up above like Youtube or Facebook  or the othe sites in the picture? If not , then these websites are social media website. Social media refers to websites that people make, share, and/or exchange information and ideas. This blog post you are reading is a part of social media. How cool is that?.Knowing about social media works effects your lives.
 

One of the first things to do on social media is creating a profile. This profile has some personal information, including whats your age, gender, and religion. The profile also includes information about what type of movies, music, books, and shows you like. A  friend in Facebook is another profile in which they are associated with your profile.


Using social media allows you to do many things including

• Playing games like Farmville, Candy Crush Saga, and Happy Pets
• Satus updates
• Uploading pictures and video
• Instant messaging
• Commenting and liking on satus updates, pictures, and videos

One of the most popular uses for social media  is playing games. This allows players to enjoy and have a fun way interacting with other people. Take for example Farmvile, people play that game to know whats like to be a farmer on the Internet. Also it gives your friends to help you out my giving you coins or lives. Also its allows having fun and competition on social media..

Satus update is one of the most popular uses for social media  . This allows the user to give short  statement about how the the is thinking about or feeling. One example is the hastag. The hastag are the keywords in the message and are linked to other posts.





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Uploading pictures and videos is another use for social media. Its gives some of the nonvermal communication into social media. Its gives people into whats happening in their lives. Taging is when an user clicks on  a picture and enters in another user.

A popular  use for social media is instant messaging. Instant messaging is when users talk to with  other by using the Internet. This can cause miscommunication and hard dealings with users.

Commenting, sharing and liking on satus updates, pictures, and videos is another use for social media. It allows the other user to share about what they're think  about the post. This can cause miscommunication and hard dealings with users.



Electricity: Paralysis Cure

History

 
In the late 1700's Giovanni Aldini claimed he could bring a man to life using only electricity. He was one of the first to use the body's natural electrical path ways to stimulate the human body. After his experiments his idea of electrical stimulation was taken even further. Scientists used his experiments to create many technologies and in the late 1900's started to experiment with paralyzed limbs. Scientists found that by sending these simulations throughout the human body they could make the paralyzed limb move.

This was the start of a revolutionary turn in electrical stimulation. Scientists further experimented with this new finding on lab rats and found that when the rats were given something, such as a treat, for moving their paralyzed limbs the rats were able to regain some control in the limb. The more the scientists experimented with these rats the more advanced the movements became. Eventually a man named Rob Summers decided to volunteer as a human trial of the new technology. After his surgery Rob was in therapy for several years learning to use the simulators implanted in his body. Sometime into his therapy Rob started to try and move his legs without the use of the simulators and was successful starting at a small level that eventually lead up to him being able to stand even when the stimulator was turned off.

The stimulation process has shown great promise and is advancing quickly. It is still in the testing stages and being improved with every test.

Simulators

The electrical simulators come in two main types. The first is a surface planted electrode. These work well for stimulating the larger muscles but neglect the more refined muscles. The second is an implanted stimulator system. This system consists of multiple small simulators that are implanted into the fine muscles. A wire lead runs between the implanted simulators and a battery pack. This particular method stimulates the delicate muscles that control finger movement and other finer movements.

The stimulation occurs by an electrical transmission sent to a particular stimulator end. This end provides a small electrical signal to the paralyzed muscles that in return move. This is not unlike the body’s natural process of sending electrical signals from the brain to the muscles through nerve pathways. The only difference is that with these simulators the body’s natural pathways don’t need to be complete.

The Body’s Reaction

After some time using a stimulator on paralyzed limbs, scientists found that with motivation a person can start to control their limb even when the simulators are turned off. This meant that the human body was able to patch the nerve pathways that were once the cause of their paralysis. After a long period of therapy a person could advance their regained control from just moving a finger or toe to being able to stand without assistance or pick up an object of some kind.

Food Processing

   

FUELING YOUR BODY

Close your eyes and imagine yourself in the fastest and coolest looking race car you can think of.  Maybe it is RED or GREEN, maybe it has stripes down the middle or it may even have flames down the side. Now start up your engine and slam your foot down on the gas pedal! But wait a second; you are running low on gas! We better make a pit stop and fill up! You pull up to the gas station and have the choice of a low grade gas or a high grade gas. Which one do you think would be best to put into your car? Low grade will not allow your race car to run as well as the high grade would. Putting a low grade fuel into your car will make it run slow and feel weighed down.  High grade gas will help you go fast and win this race! The same thing goes for the fuel you put into your body. When you eat food with lots of vitamins, you will feel a whole lot better. Exercising and filling your body with awesome high grade fuel will make thinking a lot easier and make you feel happier.   

TRAFFIC LIGHT FOODS

An easy way to clearly understand what kinds of foods are good for you and not so good for you is by comparing them to a traffic light. Green light "go" foods are foods that are going to fuel your body the best way possible by giving your body energy and nutrients to make you perform your best. Yellow light "caution" foods are foods that it is okay to eat only sometimes. Red light "stop" foods are foods that you shouldn't be putting in your body at all.



GREEN, GO!
Green light foods are the kind of food that you can find growing in your moms garden. They are the things that make your body feel great and perform the best it can. They can also come from healthy animals that live on a big, open, grassy field.

• Cucumbers
• Cauliflower
• Apples
• Grapes
• Chicken
• Fish
• Eggs
• Milk

YELLOW, CAUTION!

Yellow light foods are foods that are only okay to eat sometimes. Just like the yellow light on the traffic light means slow down, you need to slow down on eating these kinds of foods. A lot of these foods are made with sugar and white flour. These are usually the pretzels that your mom buys in a bag at the grocery store or the store bought sugar cookies grandma makes you for your lunch. They can also be drinks. My mom used to pack little Hi-C packs in my lunch box that I loved. They sure are yummy, but they are filled with sugar and artifical flavors! Yuck!

• Pretzels
• White bread
• Lemonade
• Chocolate Milk
• Ice Cream
• Cookies

RED, STOP!

Red light foods are foods that you should never eat! These are the foods that are made in factories. The easiest way to tell if a food is a red light food is by reading the label on the back of the package. If the ingredient list includes words that you have never seen or can't pronounce, you've found one! Stay far away from these foods because these ingredients can cause harm to your body. Examples of specific ingredients you will want to avoid are high fructose corn syrup, butylated hydroxytoluene, and hydrogenated oil.

• Coca Cola
• Gatorade
• Lunchables
• Kraft mac & cheese
• Doritos
• Candy


BUT, WHY?

So why am I asking you to stay FAR AWAY from these red light foods? These foods are mostly processed which means that they go through procedure called food processing which injects food with a variety of chemicals and preservatives. The reason some foods go through this process is to make them tastier and keep them fresh for a longer period of time. When you ingest food that have these harmful chemicals and preservatives you can become extremely ill. Some side effects would be obesity, high blood pressure, and even cancer in some cases. No one ever wants to be sick, so do yourself and your family a favor and ask your mom or dad to buy only green light foods. Everyone will be healthy, have lots of energy and live much longer!

Bionic Limb Technology: Megan Grozier

Imagine waking up in a hospital bed, and you reach for the glass of water on the nightstand, you scream in shock when you realize your arm, from the middle of your bicep down has been amputated. This can be the reality for many people that have unfortunately been in terrible accidents and other traumatic situations. Thankfully, doctors and others medical professionals have created a solution to help these people, this being bionic limbs.

How did we get this bionic technology? Well, we haven’t always had these robotic limbs. This technology has been around for thousands of years and improves constantly. When we started making these prosthetics they were made from heavy metal, usually iron, that was shaped into a hook, not only were these uncomfortable but they were not pleasing to the eye either. These prosthetics then transformed into more human like plastic limbs which were a little more comfortable but still had little to no useable functions. These we what people have mostly been using, and many people that suffer with limb loss have these typical plastic prosthetics. Just like anything in today’s world people are trying to and are improving things every day. Which has ultimately driven doctors to come up with mind controlled bionic limbs that would be light, comfortable and function better than the limbs that we were born with. Which in perspective work the same exact way that your normal limbs would, but with a bionic limb you could have more range when walking or for an arm you should make you wrist move three hundred and sixty degrees, where is something no human can do.

Although the idea of a mind controlled limb may seems farfetched and that it is ‘just something that you see in movies’ it’s not. This technology is the reality of hundreds of people that use this today. For example, in the video below there is a man named Zach Vawter. He is one of the first to test out and own this new bionic technology. I encourage you to watch this video below because of its link to a real life person and the explanation of how this exact technology works.

After watching that video I hope that you get the sense that what this technology is doing is not only extremely impressive but regular people use this every day to improve their lives.  Overall, this technology has made it a long way and I, along with many other people hope for this technology to continue to grow and expand to help people with traumatic limb loss. No matter what limb loss you suffered and who you are, the goal one day is to give everyone in need of a limb a mind controlled bionic.

A Modern Miracle - The Cochlear Implant

Imagine living your life without being able to hear your Mom say, "I love you!"  Imagine what it would be like not to hear your favorite song on your iPod.  Well, at least three of every 1,000 babies born each year* comes into the world with no ability to hear music or the sound of their parents' voices.  They are deaf and must spend their lives learning American Sign Language, as well as trying to adapt to a world that is more easily lived in by people who can hear.  Another 5-20 people per 100,000 people lose their hearing every year.*  Add to that one third of the elderly population* and it equals a lot of people who cannot hear.  For some deaf persons, there is hope.  Modern medicine has made it possible to change lives with a device called the cochlear implant.  This type of device sends an electrical impulse to the auditory nerve inside the ear in order to help a person hear sound. Here's a picture:

 

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From all of the labels, you can clearly tell that the ear is a pretty complex part of our bodies.  There are the three small bones--the malleus (hammer), the incus (anvil), and the stapes (stirrup)--as well as the eardrum, the cochlea, and the auditory nerve.  To these original parts of the body, inside the ear, the doctors add the receiver and the wire (electrodes) that connect the nerve to a microphone, speech processor, and transmitter on the outside of the ear.  With this device, deaf persons or those who have lost their hearing might begin to understand sounds.  Modern medicine is even making it possible to help those people with more challenging hearing issues, like Grayson.  Watch the following video:

As the video explains, Grayson was born with nerve damage and so he required a special type of implant that includes an auditory brain stem implant.  It's hard not to feel affected by Grayson's story.  It does seem like a modern miracle. The next time you see a kid on the playground with a hearing aid or similar device behind his or her ear, you should ask them about it.  Maybe they are one of the lucky ones.

Considering the number of people with hearing loss problems, especially older persons, you would think that everyone would get a cochlear implant.  However, most people with hearing loss will deny their problem for seven years* before seeking help.  Even more surprising, only 7% of those people that could be helped by cochlear implants actually have them.* Think about your grandparents. Do any of them have a difficult time watching television? Do you think they might have a better life with such a device?  Try talking to them about it.  You might actually let them know about a way to help their quality of life.

Technology like this is just one of many newer and developing pieces of machinery that doctors are connecting to the human body.  When you become an adult, I imagine that you will see even more amazing things where doctors are attaching a piece of machinery to the body.  At some point in the future, we may be perfectly normal to be a cyborg.


*Hearing loss stats. (2011). Cochlear Implant Online.  Retrieved on November 17, 2013 from http://cochlearimplantonline.com/site/cochlear-implant/hearing-loss-stats/