Yes, partially decayed zombies are gross, but what REALLY happens to THIS BEAUTIFUL
SPECIMEN OF HUMAN MEAT after it dies?
Let's get grossly detailed!!!
Death is as natural as birth, but celebrated a lot less.
At the moment of death, the brain has a surge of activity as its last oxygen is depleted,
and it then goes dark.
Hormones which regulate body functions stop being secreted by the brain, and though some
physical functions continue for a few minutes, eventually all human functions stop and the
post-death process begins.
Firstly, at death, all muscles relax.
It takes burning oxygen for energy to keep you tense, no O2, no tension.
This includes the body's sphincters, which is why death often cause defecation and incontinence.
Now, just because the body is medically DEAD, doesn't mean everything is.
Some cells continue burning remaining energy, which contributes to what happens after we
die.
Not to mention the 100 trillion bacteria living in our intestines, on our skin and elsewhere.
They've been with us our whole lives…
no reason to stop now.
Algor mortis, or the death chill, begins immediately at death.
On average, a human body loses 1.5 degrees (.83 C) an hour until it reaches room temperature.
Without a heartbeat, blood and fluids begin the lividity process, succumbing to gravity
and pooling at the lowest points in the body.
In light-skinned people, pooling blood is visible outside the body as a dark purplish-blue,
and after two hours it clots!
This is how forensic specialists can tell if a body has been moved.
Within three to six hours, rigor mortis sets in, tensing the muscles again.
After death, calcium floods the muscles, and bonds with proteins that control muscle contraction.
This uncontrolled bonding causes muscles to tense for 24-to-48 hours.
The eyes will cloud over during this time, especially if left open.
And once rigor sets in, they're stuck that way for a while, so that whole closing eye
thing in movies?
It's possible as long as you get to them quickly.
Though you might not have to, because according to a study in the Indian Journal of Palliative
Care, 63 percent of people fully closed their eyes at death!
Which seems like a lot to me...
OKAY.
SO.
You're dead, and decomposition is starting.
Your cells are dead, and are begining to break down.
In this case, cell death happens because of necrosis.
It's messy, and without circulation, the body can't come clean up the dead cell.
As carbon dioxide builds up and the pH of the tissues rise, the cells weaken and eventually
their membranes break, releasing their insides into the surrounding tissue.
Enzymes in that fluid cause damage, blistering and color changes, this continues for a while...
By the second or third day putrefaction sets in.
Oxygen is been depleted by the natural microorganisms in our respiratory and gastrointestinal systems,
and they've begun to spread into other sections of the body.
For example: enzymes in the pancreas cause it to digest itself, and the gut bacteria
LOVE that, so they eat it too -- which turns the abdomen a greenish color.
Gas begins to build up, forcing any non-digestibles like feces; out of the body.
This is when the smell is just… beyond horrible.
I've smelled it, you don't want to.
Two organic amine chemicals: putrescine and cadaverine are created during this interaction,
and eventually it makes its way into the blood vessels.
Picture a post-apocalyptic highway…
using that, they get to the rest of the body and ooze out causing a horrid rotting smell.
Eventually, necrosis and the work of bacteria changes the greenishness, to purple, and then
BLACK.
The smell causes more insects to come lay eggs and invade the body.
A single blowfly can lay 300 eggs which will hatch in a single day.
Their larvae will hatch and eat tissues nearby for a week as a maggot before transforming
into a fly itself!
Over the next week, maggots and bacteria pop holes in the body, releasing the gas (and
the smell) even more.
These maggots can consume 60-percent of a body in just a week!
But there's still a lot to go, this was just the first WEEK.
Next, butyric fermentation starts and the organs and tissues begin to dry out and wax
over, sort of like a mummy!
The tissues are being slowly digested by MORE bacteria, insects, protozoa, and fungi.
This stage takes a long time, maybe as much as a year or more in moderate temperatures.
Once the fluids are mostly dry, post-decay starts.
The soft tissues and organs are dried up and consumed, but bones, hair, cartilage and sticky
byproducts of the earlier stages are still around.
This is when a variety of beetles and flies move in each species looking to eat away at
part of what's left.
Over the subsequent years, plants and animals will eat away the skeleton and eventually…
dust to dust.
Gone forever.
Of course, in modern life, we usually never get past the first few days.
Embalming helps delay much of these processes, as does cooling the body!
This is if you left a human laying around, like an old pizza.
Sure, we die, but all these things live on thanks to our gross wet corpses!
It's inevitable, and fascinating.
I could do five more episodes on this stuff!
Let us know what you think about this down below…
not like… buried or whatever…
like in the comments.