Six things you don't know exactly about your tongue.

The human tongue is a muscular organ covered with a mucous membrane. This small body performs many functions: it is a body of taste and performs a tactile function, helps to process food, participates in the process of swallowing. The tongue affects the correct sound reproduction and determines the tone of the voice. Without tongue, human speech is impossible. In infants, the tongue is responsible for the process of sucking milk. So what else do we not know about our tongue?

The size of the tongue

The average length of the human tongue is 5 cm. it is considered only the length of the outer part of the tongue (from the tip of the tongue to the middle of the upper lip). World record Book Guinness record belongs to Nick Stoberl from California, USA. The size of his tongue is 10.1 cm. By the way, women have shorter tongues than men do.

Taste buds

The tongue contains from 2 000 to 10 000 taste buds. People with a large number of buds are born tasters. People with less — problems with the definition of taste. The taste buds are not visible to the human eye. They are updated every 10-14 days. Women have more taste buds. So it's no surprise that women love sweets more than men. With age, the number of taste buds is usually reduced, resulting in changes and sense of taste.

Taste zones of the tongue

There are 4 zones of taste perception on the tongue: 1-bitter, 2-sour 3-salty, 4-sweet. The essence of the taste zones is as follows: in each of them a certain taste is felt a little better than in others. To determine the taste, the tongue must be wet. If you put a piece of lemon on a dry tongue, the brain won't get any taste signal.

The ability to twist a tongue is not genetic.

In 1940, the American geneticist Alfred Sturtevant suggested that the ability to turn tongue into a tube is the work of dominant genes (that is strong). And that only people whose parents also have this ability can curtail their tongue with a tube. However, in 1950 in a study of 33 pairs of twins in seven cases this was not confirmed: one of the twins could, and the other does not. I must say that this misconception is very popular and now — some teachers use it to explain the essence of inheritance of genetic traits. However, there is no scientific justification for this phenomenon, so it is a myth.

Tongue is not the strongest muscle.

The strongest human muscle is not the tongue, as many claim. First, the tongue-a muscle that consists of 16 muscles, and secondly, the strongest it is called, implying the power of the word. By the way about the strongest muscle, the generated force is the masseter, the root human teeth it develops force up to 72 kg. The strong tensile of the calf, it can hold weight up to 130 kg. If someone remember about the heart, the heart is the most resilient muscle.

By the color of the tongue can be judged on health

Color a healthy tongue is pale pink. If there are disorders in the body, the tongue changes its color or it appears plaque.

• Pale - lack of vitamins, malnutrition.

• White-dehydration, fungal infection, flu.

• Yellow-problems with the gastrointestinal tract, liver. It is also the color of the tongue of smokers.

• Red-infectious, inflammatory diseases.

• Bright red-heart problems, blood diseases.

• Blue-kidney disease.

The color of the plaque may differ from the color of the tongue. In this case, the thickness of the plaque is directly proportional to the severity of the problem to which it points:

• Thick white plaque-Intoxication, infectious diseases.

• Yellow-problems with the digestive system.

• Gray-gastritis, stomach ulcer.

• Brown coating - problems with the lungs.

When brushing your teeth, be sure to check the condition of the tongue and its color. Do not ignore its purification. Also, pay attention to any bumps, damage or other suspicious changes. Conditions that do not pass for several days require mandatory consultation with a doctor. Moreover, as doctors assure, in time the diagnosed disease is a serious step to a healthy organism.