From Aerosmith Lead Singer Steven Tyler’s Vocal Cords to Olympic Athletes’ Prowess to Blue Angels’ Endurance —Incredible Human Machine Details Extreme Human Feats, Cutting-Edge Medical Science and the Body’s Daily Marvels
While we may have taught computers to ‘think’ and robots to talk, no modern technology can compare to the most versatile machine that has dominated the planet for thousands of years: the human body.
Premiering Sunday, October 21 9pm ET/8pm PT, National Geographic Channel’s Incredible Human Machine takes viewers on an intricate two-hour guided tour inside the human body from head to toe. With phenomenal computer generated images (CGI) and magnified camera technology, this breathtaking special unearths the complex functions that enable humans to see, smell, hear, think, move and heal.
Incredible Human Machine examines what keeps our 100 trillion cells working everyday. If it requires as many as 100 muscles just to say ‘hello’, how is the body able to conquer even more complicated tasks like propelling the body forward? Remarkably detailed CGI illustrate the nuances of the body – from how three tiny tubes in the ears help us stay balanced to the two million holes across our skin that act as our heating and cooling systems.
To demonstrate the power of human speech, Incredible Human Machine goes backstage at an Aerosmith concert to evaluate stress on lead singer Steven Tyler’s vocal cords. In what represents a historical first, researchers are able to conduct real time measurers of a performer during a live event in front of tens of thousands of people. Tyler’s vocal cords slam together more than half a million times during the course of a single concert. Viewers can watch first-hand as state of the art laser technology eliminates fragile blood vessels on Tyler’s vocal cords to help his finely tuned vocal cords spring back into action.
This laser technology along with other innovative surgeries are just a few of the next generation of treatment options that will keep us running in the years to come. Watch as doctors harvest nerves from the leg to act as a ‘splice wire’, restoring mobility to a patient’s arm. In another experimental surgery to remove a brain tumour, doctors keep their patient awake while they operate to keep his ability to speak intact.
From the 97,000 kilometres of arteries, veins and capillaries – enough ‘roadway’ to loop twice around the world – to 120 million photoreceptors in our eyes, 10,000 taste buds on our tongues and 10 million ‘smell distinguishers’ in our noses, Incredible Human Machine explains them all.
Incredible Human Machine is produced for National Geographic Channels International by National Geographic Television. Eleanor Grant is the Executive Producer for National Geographic Television. For National Geographic Channels International, Executive Vice President of Content is Sydney Suissa.
For more information on the program click here.
