Perspiration

Perspiration
Amanda Françozo At The Runner Sports Fragment.jpg

The facial sweat of a runner
ICD-10 R61.
ICD-9 780.8

Perspiration (sweating, transpiration, or diaphoresis) is the production of a fluid consisting primarily of water as well as various dissolved solids (chiefly chlorides), that is excreted by the sweat glands in the skin of mammals.[1] Sweat contains the chemicals or odorants 2-methylphenol (o-cresol) and 4-methylphenol (p-cresol), as well as a small amount of urea.

In humans, sweating is primarily a means of thermoregulation, although it has been proposed that components of male sweat can act as pheromonal cues.[2] There is widespread belief that sweating, for example, in a sauna, helps the body to remove toxins, but the belief is without scientific support.[3] Evaporation of sweat from the skin surface has a cooling effect due to the latent heat of evaporation of water. Hence, in hot weather, or when the individual's muscles heat up due to exertion, more sweat is produced. Sweating is increased by nervousness and nausea and decreased by cold. Animals with few sweat glands, such as dogs, accomplish similar temperature regulation results by panting, which evaporates water from the moist lining of the oral cavity and pharynx. Primates and horses have armpits that sweat like those of humans. Although sweating is found in a wide variety of mammals,[4][5] relatively few, such as humans and horses, produce large amounts of sweat in order to cool down.[6]

Contents

Definition

Mechanism

A man sweats after exercising.

Sweating allows the body to regulate its temperature. Sweating is controlled from a center in the preoptic and anterior regions of the hypothalamus, where thermosensitive neurons are located. The heat-regulatory function of the hypothalamus is also affected by inputs from temperature receptors in the skin. High skin temperature reduces the hypothalamic set point for sweating and increases the gain of the hypothalamic feedback system in response to variations in core temperature. Overall, however, the sweating response to a rise in hypothalamic ('core') temperature is much larger than the response to the same increase in average skin temperature. The process of sweating decreases core temperature, whereas the process of evaporation decreases surface temperature.

There are two situations in which our nerves will stimulate sweat glands, making us sweat: during physical heat and emotional stress. In general, emotionally induced sweating is restricted to palms, soles, and sometimes the forehead, while physical heat-induced sweating occurs throughout the body. [10]

Sweat is not pure water; it always contains a small amount (0.2–1%) of solute. When a person moves from a cold climate to a hot climate, adaptive changes occur in the sweating mechanisms of the person. This process is referred to as acclimatisation: the maximum rate of sweating increases and its solute composition decreases. The volume of water lost in sweat daily is highly variable, ranging from 100 to 8,000 mL/day. The solute loss can be as much as 350 mmol/day (or 90 mmol/day acclimatised) of sodium under the most extreme conditions. In a cool climate and in the absence of exercise, sodium loss can be very low (less than 5 mmols/day). Sodium concentration in sweat is 30-65 mmol/l, depending on the degree of acclimatisation.

Composition

Sweat contains mainly water. It also contains minerals, lactate, and urea. Mineral composition varies with the individual, their acclimatisation to heat, exercise and sweating, the particular stress source (exercise, sauna, etc.), the duration of sweating, and the composition of minerals in the body. An indication of the minerals content is sodium 0.9 gram/liter, potassium 0.2 gram/liter, calcium 0.015 gram/liter, magnesium 0.0013 gram/liter.[11] Also many other trace elements are excreted in sweat, again an indication of their concentration is (although measurements can vary fifteenfold) zinc (0.4 mg/l), copper (0.3–0.8 mg/l), iron (1 mg/l), chromium (0.1 mg/l), nickel (0.05 mg/l), lead (0.05 mg/l).[12][13] Probably many other less-abundant trace minerals leave the body through sweating with correspondingly lower concentrations. In humans sweat is hypoosmotic relative to plasma.[14]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Mosher HH (1933). "Simultaneous Study of Constituents of Urine and Perspiration". The Journal of Biological Chemistry 99: 781–790. http://www.jbc.org/cgi/reprint/99/3/781.pdf. 
  2. ↑ Wyart C, Webster WW, Chen JH, et al. (February 2007). "Smelling a single component of male sweat alters levels of cortisol in women". The Journal of Neuroscience 27 (6): 1261–5. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4430-06.2007. PMID 17287500. Lay summary – UC Berkeley News (6 February 2007). 
  3. ↑ http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/28/health/he-skeptic28 You sweat, but toxins likely stay
  4. ↑ Goglia G (January 1953). "[Further research on the branched sweat glands in some mammals (Cavia cobaya, Sus scrofa, Equus caballus).]" (in Undetermined). Bollettino Della Società Italiana Di Biologia Sperimentale 29 (1): 58–60. PMID 13066656. 
  5. ↑ Robertshaw D, Taylor CR (November 1969). "Sweat gland function of the donkey (Equus asinus)". The Journal of Physiology 205 (1): 79–89. PMID 5347721. PMC 1348626. http://www.jphysiol.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=5347721. 
  6. ↑ McDonald RE, Fleming RI, Beeley JG, et al. (2009). "Latherin: a surfactant protein of horse sweat and saliva". PLoS ONE 4 (5): e5726. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0005726. PMID 19478940. 
  7. ↑ [1]
  8. ↑ [2]
  9. ↑ Parsons K (2009). "Maintaining health, comfort and productivity in heat waves". Glob Health Action 2. doi:10.3402/gha.v2i0.2057. PMID 20052377. 
  10. ↑ Kameia, Tomoya; Tsudab, Takao; Kitagawab, Shinya; Naitoha, Ken; Nakashimaa, Koji; Ohhashi, Toshio (June 1998). "Physical stimuli and emotional stress-induced sweat secretions in the human palm and forehead". Analytica Chimica Acta 365 (1-3): 319–326. doi:10.1016/S0003-2670(97)00642-9. 
  11. ↑ [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18156662 "Sweat mineral-element responses during 7 h of exercise-heat stress," Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 2007 Dec;17(6):574-82.
  12. ↑ Cohn JR, Emmett EA (1978). "The excretion of trace metals in human sweat". Annals of Clinical and Laboratory Science 8 (4): 270–5. PMID 686643. 
  13. ↑ Saraymen, Recep; Kılıç, Eser; Yazar, Süleyman (2004). "Sweat Copper, Zinc, Iron, Magnesium and Chromium Levels in National Wrestler". İnönü Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi Dergisi 11 (1): 7–10. http://mail.inonu.edu.tr/~tipdergi/include/getdoc.php?id=79&article=35&mode=pdf. 
  14. ↑ Constanzo, Linda S.. BRS Physiology (4th ed.). p. 155. 

Further reading