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There’s Really Only One Way To Die
There’s Really Only One Way To Die
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Subtitles (47)
0:00
Cancer, heart disease, allergic reactions, drowning in molasses, getting your head bitten
0:06
off by a grizzly bear – there are LOTS of things out there that can kill you.
0:10
But when it comes to the inner workings of the human body,
0:14
it turns out that everybody actually dies from the same thing.
0:17
Hi, I’m Kate and this is MinuteEarth.
0:20
We often use specific biological hallmarks,
0:23
like a person’s heartbeat or brain activity, to divide life from death.
0:28
But there’s something much more fundamental that drives these processes, and all the
0:32
other life-sustaining processes constantly going on in your body:
0:35
ATP, our body’s energy source.
0:38
Every single cause of death out there actually kills us by interfering with
0:42
our ability to produce ATP, powering down the very processes that keep us alive.
0:48
OK, every cause of death except something like a nuclear explosion,
0:52
which obliterates the need for these processes in the first place.
0:56
But for the vast majority of us, death is a dearth of ATP.
1:01
It takes two ingredients to make ATP:
1:03
fuel and oxygen… without enough of either one,
1:07
your cells can’t produce enough ATP to keep you alive.
1:10
Starvation, for instance, is a matter of not having enough fuel to convert into ATP.
1:15
But cells are really good at scavenging our bodies’ stores of fat, protein,
1:19
and carbs, so in most causes of death, fuel isn’t the limiting factor… oxygen is.
1:25
Normally, our respiratory system grabs oxygen from the air, then our
1:29
circulatory system shuttles it to various organs, where cells use it to make ATP.
1:34
Most causes of death interrupt this journey in some way.
1:37
Some mess with the initial oxygen-acquiring part; like, pneumonia fills the lungs with fluid,
1:43
preventing oxygen from making it into the bloodstream in the first place.
1:47
Other respiratory problems, like lung cancer, anaphylaxis, and drowning,
1:51
also prevent the respiratory system from effectively grabbing oxygen from the air.
1:56
Most causes of death, though, interfere with the second part of the oxygen pathway.
2:00
Like heart disease, the most common cause of death worldwide, narrows the arteries,
2:05
restricting the flow of blood throughout the rest of the body.
2:08
Electrocution messes with the electrical signals that regulate the pumping of the
2:12
various chambers of the heart, leaving them unable to effectively pump blood.
2:16
Strokes – another major cause of death – happen when blood can’t reach the brain.
2:20
And sudden trauma can cause so much blood loss that the pressure in the
2:24
circulatory system drops, leaving it unable to move blood through the body.
2:29
In each of these cases, even though enough oxygen has made it into the body,
2:33
that oxygen isn’t getting carried to cells, where it’s needed to produce ATP.
2:38
And in a few especially-weird causes of death, plenty of oxygen is making
2:42
it into the body AND getting where it needs to go, but cells can’t use it.
2:47
Cyanide, for instance, messes with the cellular machinery that makes ATP,
2:52
leaving it unable to use oxygen to complete the reaction.
2:55
There are a ton of ways to interfere with the ATP
2:58
production pathway – that’s why there are so many so-called “causes of death”.
3:03
But no matter where – or how – the pathway fails, the ultimate result is the same:
3:08
your body can’t produce enough energy to carry out the processes needed to actually maintain life.
3:14
In the end, a lack of ATP is the ultimate cause of every single case of RIP.
There’s Really Only One Way To Die - Video học tiếng Anh
