IX.

FEEDBACK MECHANISMS GENERAL BIOLOGY 2

4TH QUARTER
Homeostasis
 The body works at a certain range of conditions (such as blood glucose level, body temperature and blood
pH). Diseases normally disrupt these conditions and the body must try to return the conditions back to normal.
 Homeostasis is the physiological consistency of the body despite external fluctuations. All complex
multicellular organisms maintain a stable internal environment using their organ systems.
 Homeostasis in a general sense refers to stability, balance or equilibrium. It is the body's attempt to maintain a
constant internal environment. Maintaining a stable internal environment requires constant monitoring and
adjustments as conditions change. The adjustment of physiological systems within the body is called
homeostatic regulation.
The homeostatic control has three components:
 A receptor (sense organ) to detect a change.
 A center of control (the brain or the spinal cord) that will process and integrate what is happening.
 An effector (muscle cells or organs/ glands) to produce a response appropriate to the change.
 There are ways of communication among these components (basically through the nervous and endocrine
control).
When a change of variable occurs, there are two main types of feedback to which the system reacts:
 Negative feedback: a reaction in which the system responds in such a way as to reverse the direction of
change.
 Thermoregulation
*Body temperature is a balance between heat gain and heat loss.
*Heat is produced through metabolism.
*Heat is exchanged through radiation, conduction, convection, and evaporation.
*The greater the temperature difference, the greater the rate of heat exchange.
*Body temperature is regulated at a “set point” by neural circuits in the hypothalamus.
*Dilation of blood vessels in the skin and sweating can increase heat loss from the body.
*Constriction of blood vessels in the skin and shivering promote heat gain by the body.
 Carbon dioxide concentration
 Blood sugar level
 Positive feedback: a response is occurs to amplify the change in the variable. (This has a destabilizing effect,
so does not result in homeostasis. Positive feedback is less common in naturally occurring systems than
negative feedback, but it has its applications.)
 For example, in nerves, a threshold electric potential triggers the generation of a much larger action
potential.
 Blood clotting
 Events in childbirth