And on a side note: if anyone is considering going back to school and you are in your 30's, I would highly encourage it. Because once you get to the age where you ARE the oldest one in the class, you are usually the "talker". Noone likes the talker. We just want to get on with lecture and go home. Anyway...
For the past two weeks, we have been working with frogs in my physiology lab.
**Disclaimer: If you have a "weak" stomach, are pregnant, or have a family history of cardiovascular disease- read at your own risk.**
Well, I'm gonna give you the "dumbed up" version of what we have been doing. A couple of weeks ago, we were given frogs who had been pithed. O.k., in the lab's defense they "claimed" (and I am using the word claim very loosely- which will be explained later) they had been double-pithed.
If you don't know what it means to pith an animal. You basically scramble the central nervous system by sticking a wire through the spinal canal and/or brain (hence the double). The idea here is that it may hurt like hell when they do that, but afterwards the animal (which is still alive) will not be aware of any pain.
I know. I told you.
So, we've been given our own little live, pithed (double-pithed....ahemmm) kermit. They kindly positioned a small towlet over it's head. I guess they didn't want the frogs to put a face with the pain. Now we get to cut away the skin on the frog's leg from the groin area and pull it down all the way to the ankle- much like any woman would a stocking.
The frog is still alive.
Then we get to search through the frog's leg muscles and locate the sciatic nerve, lift it up gently, we don't want to tear it -the frog is alive. Then we get to insert a probe underneath this nerve.
A probe which will administer electrical shocks at increasing voltage. (I did not man the computer which did this). But I was in charge of repositioning the probe after each subsequent shock as it got loose from the frog jerking and all.
Oh, did I fail to mention that before all that, we had to cut the Achilles tendon so that we could raise the calf muscle up suspended, taught, and tied to a manifold? I don't know about ya'll, but even if the mob chose to cut someone's Achilles tendon I don't think they'd go the extra mile and hang it up after...
Well, the experiment was complete and after many "I'm sorry little guy" statements, we got to put him in a bag with the other 5 mutilated frogs so that they could all join one another in the freezer to finally face their deaths. Alive.
I'll spare the details and leave last week's experiment at this:
The frog's sternum was cut open, the heart was exposed, and chemicals were poured on it to either make it contract faster or slower. All so that we could watch this increase/decrease in the heart pumping with our very own eyes.
I was not in lab that day. (I had a previous engagement which I will save for another post because I'd rather not mix the good with the bad.) I couldn't be more thankful for missing that lab because it turned out, our frog wasn't completely pithed. The right side kept moving and jerking throughout the experiment I'm told.
That, and they discovered she was pregnant...
***no frogs were injured in the writing of this post***
3 comments:
OK, I read that when you first posted and didn't know what an appropriate comment would be.
So let me just say, well written essay and better you than me :)
Ack.
Ack.
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