Results tagged “bodyworlds”

It has long been held that the mysteries of the human body be revealed to a select group of degree laden individuals, physicians and scientists alike, whose rigorous scholastic upbringing served as an all access pass to our anatomy and physiology. The layperson, meanwhile, was left to entrust his or her precious and vastly complicated system to the aforementioned guru or, more often then not, lay awake at night worrying about that enigmatic pain that just won’t go away. But with the advent of reality TV and the sequencing of the human genome, the disparity between those who know and those who don’t is slowly going the way of bloodletting and elecrtroshock therapy. At the forefront of the movement to reveal the machine behind the curtain is Body Worlds' inventor Dr. Gunther von Hagens, whose patented process of Plastination has allowed the human (and equine) body to be preserved in a state of undress.

                 

Body Worlds 3 looks at the human body and heart in ways that you've never seen before. / Photo by Christine N. Ziemba for LAist-->Body Worlds 3 & The Story of the Heart opened at the California Science Center last week, and LAist was there to take in the dramatic, creepy and fascinating look at the inner workings of the human body.

Of course, the biggest local story is the death of Johnny Carson. The LA Times has an obituary written by Daily Variety's Brian Lowry and focuses on his entertainment career. The Daily News takes an even more local look and examines how America's greatest talk show host effected Burbank. Johnny Carson was 79 years old.

During a visit last night, we overheard a woman mumur to her sullen, teenage son as they both examined the tar-blackened lungs of a deceased smoker:

But then came plastination, the process in which a human body is, in effect, transformed into a skinless action figure. This fascinating, though creepy, process is currently on display at the California Science Center, in an exhibition called, appropriately enough, Body Worlds.