CLICK HERE to listen to episode audio (4:19).
Sections below are the following:
Transcript of Audio
Audio Notes and Acknowledgments
Images
Sources
Related Water Radio Episodes
For Virginia Teachers (Relevant SOLs, etc.).
Unless otherwise noted, all Web addresses mentioned were functional as of 9-3-21.
TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO
From the Cumberland Gap to the Atlantic Ocean, this is Virginia Water Radio for the week of September 6, 2021. This revised episode from October 2017 is part of a series this fall of episodes on water connections to the human body and human biology.
SOUND - ~3
sec
How is a human heartbeat part of a water story? Have a listen for about 25 seconds to the
following mystery sounds, and see if you can guess the heart-and-water
connections they represent. And here’s a hint: if you have the energy,
you could follow many branches to this solution.
SOUNDS - ~21 sec
You’ve been listening to sounds from a platelets donation at the
American Red Cross’ New River Valley Donor Center in Blacksburg,
Virginia. The sounds—a blood-pressure measurement, a needle stick into an
arm vein, and the machine separating blood components and recirculating fluid
to the patient—illustrate three connections between the human circulatory
system and water.
First, the heart provides a force—measured by blood pressure—to keep blood
circulating around the body, like the sun’s energy powers evaporation and winds
that help keep water circulating around the earth. Second, arm veins are
part of an intricately branched system of arteries, veins, and capillaries,
resembling a watershed’s branching pattern as one travels uphill from ocean to
river to headwater streams. Humans have an estimated 60,000 to 100,000
miles of blood vessels, compared to Virginia’s approximately 100,000 miles of
rivers and streams. Finally, blood’s components are mostly water: blood plasma
is a solution of water and many biochemicals, mixed with water-based red and
white blood cells and with platelets. As a result, blood in the human
system has water’s physical and chemical properties for transporting materials
and regulating heat.
Cells and transported substances make blood “thicker” than water, just as the
saying goes. But the water we borrow temporarily from the global water
cycle is at the chemical and physical heart of blood and the circulatory
system’s vital functions.
Thanks to staff at the New River Valley Donor Center for participating in this
episode, and thanks to Soundbible.com for the heartbeat sound.
We close with some music inspired by the action of the human
heart. Here’s about 20 seconds of
“Heartbeat,” by the Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, Va.-based band, The
Steel Wheels.
MUSIC - ~23 sec –Lyrics - “Feel my heartbeat comin’ in next to you; heartbeat, yes you do.”
SHIP’S BELL
Virginia Water Radio is produced by the Virginia Water Resources Research Center, part of Virginia Tech’s College of Natural Resources and Environment. For more Virginia water sounds, music, or information, visit us online at virginiawaterradio.org, or call the Water Center at (540) 231-5624. Thanks to Ben Cosgrove for his version of “Shenandoah” to open and close the show. In Blacksburg, I’m Alan Raflo, thanking you for listening, and wishing you health, wisdom, and good water.
AUDIO NOTES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This Virginia Water Radio episode revises and replaces
Episode 392, 10-30-17, and Episode 236, 10-20-14.
The human heartbeat sound was recorded by Mike Koenig and
made available (9/14/09 upload) online at the Soundbible.com Web site, http://soundbible.com/1001-Heartbeat.html,
for public use under the Creative Commons license “Attribution 3.0”; for more
information on Creative Commons licenses, please see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/;
information on the Attribution License specifically is online at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/.
Other sounds heard in this episode were recorded at the American Red Cross New
River Donor Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, during an October 19, 2014,
platelet donation by Virginia Water Radio host Alan Raflo. Thanks to the
staff at the Donor Center for their help and for allowing the sound
recording. For information about blood
and platelet donations, please visit the American Red Cross’ “Donating Blood”
Web site at http://www.redcrossblood.org/donating-blood.
“Heartbeat,” by The Steel Wheels, is from the 2017 album
“Wild As We Came Here,” used with permission. More information about The
Steel Wheels is available online at http://www.thesteelwheels.com/. This music was used previously by Virginia Water Radio in Episode 428, 7-9-18.
Click
here if you’d like to hear the full version (2 min./22 sec.) of the
“Shenandoah” arrangement/performance by Ben Cosgrove that opens and closes this
episode. More information about Mr.
Cosgrove is available online at http://www.bencosgrove.com.
IMAGES
SOURCES
Used for Audio
Adrian Bejan, Shape and Structure, from Engineering to
Nature, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England, 2000.
Cleveland Clinic, “Heart & Blood Vessels: How Does Blood Travel Through Your Body,” online at https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/heart-blood-vessels-blood-flow-body.
The Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, Penn., “Blood Vessels,” online at https://www.fi.edu/heart/blood-vessels.
Leslie Mertz, The Circulatory System, Greenwood
Press, Westport, Conn., 2004.
Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, “Final 2020 305(b)/303(d) Water Quality Assessment Integrated Report,” Chapter 2: State Background Information, online at https://www.deq.virginia.gov/water/water-quality/assessments/integrated-report. (This source states, “Virginia has an estimated 100,923 miles of streams and rivers divided into nine major river basins.”)
For More Information about Blood and the Circulatory
System
American Society of Hematology, “Blood Basics,” online at https://www.hematology.org/education/patients/blood-basics.
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, “Facts About Blood
and Blood Cells,” online at https://www.mskcc.org/cancer-care/patient-education/facts-about-blood-and-blood-cells.
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Blood Safety,” online at http://www.cdc.gov/bloodsafety/.
U.S. National Institutes of Health/National Cancer
Institute, SEER Training Module, “Leukemia/Anatomy,” online at http://training.seer.cancer.gov/leukemia/anatomy/.
U.S. National Institutes of Health/National Library of Medicine, “Blood, Heart
and Circulation,” online at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/bloodheartandcirculation.html.
RELATED VIRGINIA WATER RADIO EPISODES
All Water Radio episodes are listed by category at the Index link above (http://www.virginiawaterradio.org/p/index.html). See particularly the “Science” subject category.
Following are links to other episodes on connections of water to human biology. Please note that some of these episodes are being redone in fall 2021; in those cases, the respective links below will have information on the updated episodes.
Episode 195, 1-6-14 – Water
thermodynamics.
Episode 287, 10-26-15 – Skeleton
system connections to water.
Episode 392, 10-30-17 –
Circulatory system connections to water.
Episode 393, 11-6-17 – Disease:
Influenza.
Episode 450, 12-10-18 –
Neurological system connections to water
Episode 466, 4-1-19 – Water
intake and sports.
Episode 517, 3-23-20 and Episode 519, 4-6-20 – Disease:
Water connections to COVID-19.
Episode 592, 8-30-21 – Overview of the human body’s uses of
water.
FOR VIRGINIA TEACHERS – RELATED STANDARDS OF LEARNING (SOLs) AND OTHER INFORMATION
Following are some Virginia Standards of Learning (SOLs) that may be supported by this episode’s audio/transcript, sources, or other information included in this post.
2020 Music SOLs
SOLs at various grade levels that call for “examining the relationship of music to the other fine arts and other fields of knowledge.”
2018 Science SOLs
Grades K-3 plus 5: Matter
K.4 – Water is important in our daily lives and has
properties.
Grades K-5: Earth and
Space Systems
3.7 – There is a water cycle and water is important to life
on Earth.
Grade 6
6.6 – Water has unique physical properties and has a role in
the natural and human-made environment.
Biology
BIO.2 – Chemical and biochemical processes are essential for
life.
BIO.3 – Cells have structure and function.
Virginia’s SOLs are available from the Virginia Department of Education, online at http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/.
Following are links to Water Radio episodes (various topics) designed especially for certain K-12 grade
levels.
Episode 250, 1-26-15 – on boiling, for kindergarten through 3rd
grade.
Episode
255, 3-2-15 – on density, for 5th and 6th grade.
Episode 282, 9-21-15 – on living vs. non-living, for
kindergarten.
Episode 309, 3-28-16 – on temperature regulation in animals, for
kindergarten through 12th grade.
Episode 333, 9-12-16 – on dissolved gases, especially dissolved
oxygen in aquatic habitats, for 5th grade.
Episode 403, 1-15-18 – on freezing and ice, for kindergarten
through 3rd grade.
Episode 404, 1-22-18 – on ice on ponds and lakes, for 4th
through 8th grade.
Episode 406, 2-5-18 – on ice on rivers, for middle school.
Episode 407, 2-12-18 – on snow chemistry and physics, for high
school.
Episode 483, 7-29-19 – on buoyancy and drag, for middle school
and high school.
Episode 524, 5-11-20 – on sounds by water-related animals, for
elementary school through high school.
Episode 531, 6-29-20 – on various ways that animals get water,
for 3rd and 4th grade.
Episode 539, 8-24-20 –
on basic numbers and facts about Virginia’s water resources, for 4th and 6th
grade.
