Massage Therapy: Human Physiology

From the Britannica Concise Encyclopedia:
Study of the functioning of living organisms or their constituent tissues or cells.

Or labor, delivery of the fetus by the viviparous mammal. Birth is also known as parturition.

Cessation of all life (metabolic) processes. Death may involve the organism as a whole (somatic death) or may be confined to cells and tissues within the organism.

Process by which food eaten by an animal is broken down mechanically, and chemically by enzymes, mostly in the stomach and intestines, to make the nutrients available for absorption and cell metabolism.

In the body, all the organs and tissues involved in the digestion of food. In animals, these consist of the mouth, stomach, intestines, and their associated glands.

Body control system composed of a group of glands that maintain a stable internal environment by producing chemical regulatory substances called hormones.

Periodic flow of blood and cells from the lining of the uterus in humans and most other primates, occurring about every 28 days in women.

Network of specialized tissue that controls actions and reactions of the body and its adjustment to the environment.

Elongated cell that transmits information rapidly between different parts of the body, the basic functional unit of the nervous system.

Process that occurs inside cells in which carbohydrate, particularly glucose, is broken down to release energy that the cell can use.

Group of organs of the body concerned with excretion of urine, that is, water and the waste products of metabolism.