Did you know that there are an awful lot of things we still can’t explain?

Despite the billions of dollars and decades of research, scientists still don’t know the answers to some seemingly very simple things. And this is not just in the field of medicine. Physics, geology, and history have their trove of mysteries too.

For example, we still don’t understand what ball lightning is or how in the world quantum entanglements happen. We observe these natural phenomena but are lost as to the “Why?” and “How?”. 

The human body and biology present a mountain of mysteries and questions we can only hope to understand soon.

Here’s the tip of the iceberg…

1) Why do we have fingerprints?

You might have had a jolly good time with them in play school when you used to slather your palms in paint and transfer them onto paper, revealing a set of lines in your hands. But besides being beautiful refrigerator door art, we don’t know why we have fingerprints.

We used to believe that they are used for gripping things. But it turns out that fingerprints result in less surface area contact than a perfectly smooth surface. This means less friction, ultimately leading to less efficient gripping. This has led many scientists to question the utility of fingerprints.  

We don’t know why no two humans have the same prints, even identical twins.

Surely there must be a good reason for them, (besides helping CSI shows identify the killer) because when you burn or take off the skin with the fingerprints, they regenerate after a month.    

2) Why do we yawn?

It’s the end of a long day, and we’re about to turn in for the night. But why do we yawn?

“We yawn because we’re sleepy and that’s our body’s way of telling us to take a rest,” you might say.

But there might be more to the simple act of yawning than this hypothesis. We yawn not only when we’re sleepy or bored. People yawn even when they’re about to perform an adrenalin-pumping sequence of events, like a musician about to hit the stage or paratroopers about to dive. Yawning is not a passive act of lethargy. Dogs are known to yawn before going for the bite.

Yawning can cause erection in rats, and as a side-effect of some antidepressant drugs, it can trigger orgasms in some people.   

And yawning just might be one of the most contagious things there is. Even reading about yawning or seeing it in a YouTube video can trigger the body to react accordingly. Dogs can even catch it from their owners.  

This simple act of releasing air, (accompanied by a stretch or two), spins a complex web of connections that include sex and empathy.

3) Why do we have different blood types?

When a person comes in for a blood transfusion at a hospital, the first thing nurses and medical technologists do is ascertain the patient’s blood type. The most common ones are types A, B, AB, and O, and these are determined by the type of antigen found on the blood cells.

Getting the wrong blood type, say an “O” receiving an “A,” can result in a major hemolytic transfusion reaction. The patient’s body will attack the donated blood cells, ripping them apart, causing the patient to get severely sick and even go into shock. Kidneys can fail, and the patient can die.

But why are there different blood types in the first place? (A child can even have a blood type that’s different from both parents.) While we know so much about the functions and processes of blood, the emergence of different blood types has been in want of a good explanation. It has largely remained a mystery.

Karl Landsteiner discovered blood types and in 1930 won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine.   

Ajit Varki, a biologist at the University of California, San Diego, said of the phenomena, “Isn’t it amazing? Almost a hundred years after the Nobel Prize was awarded for this discovery, we still don’t know exactly what they’re for.”   

4) Foreign Accent Syndrome

Imagine waking up one morning and instead of saying, “Good morning” to your family, you blurt out a hearty, “Gawd Mawnin’!” That is, you’ve put on a new accent, overnight.

Sounds like hogwash, but this is the experience of people diagnosed with FAS or Foreign Accent Syndrome. Sometimes the switch even takes place mid-sentence, like what happened to an Australian girl who suddenly spoke in a distinct Irish accent before finishing her next sentence.

There have been about 100 known cases worldwide, and we have examples of Australian or British speakers suddenly sounding like they come from other places, speaking English with an Eastern European accent or a Chinese accent.

FAS is thought to be caused by psychological or neurological damage to the brain. We know that these people are not “faking it,” going for the laugh or the fame. What these folks have in common is that they have experienced some damage or disruption to the language mechanism in the brain. One case appeared after severe migraine. Another had it after starting a new epilepsy medication. One girl who had her tonsils removed began sounding Irish. (She had never been to Ireland.)

We know that the language portions of the brain have changed because we can see them in an fMRI scan. We just don’t know how and why they happen. It remains a medical mystery that has stumped doctors and linguists around the world.        

5) Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM)

What if you’re someone who never forgets anything? Literally. What if you remember the exact shirt you wore on July 3, 2010?

You remember every second of your life. You recall everything you did on a certain date: who you were with, what you ate, the places you went to. Most people can’t even remember what they had for breakfast yesterday or where they placed their eyeglasses.

Recalling every detail of every day, this is the life of people with hyperthymesia or Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM), and there have been less than a hundred people identified with such condition.

One might see this as a neat party trick or something that comes in handy in a big history quiz. But having the condition also means not being able to let go of break-ups, the death of a loved one, and remembering every negative feeling in the past. As one person puts it:  “It is non-stop, uncontrollable, and exhausting.” One memory triggers another, then another, and then another in an explosive chain reaction.

Why does HSAM happen? Nobody knows for sure. There have been so few cases which makes it hard to investigate. 

We do know that there are enlarged portions in the brain. But beyond that, it is still a mystery that will boggle the mind for years to come.

 6) Spontaneous Healings

Our science and medicine have come a long way in understanding a host of diseases. And we have made massive strides in the treatment of conditions like cancer. But how do you explain a phenomenon like spontaneous healing?

A tumor going away overnight. An incurable disease suddenly leaves no trace. A bed-ridden patient at death’s door, sudden running laps around the village, without so much as taking a single pill. Or how about a documented case of tumor disappearing, not overnight, but before one’s very eyes (via ultrasound), with only the power of belief.

There have been many cases of this. An incurable disease suddenly gets healed. You can call it spontaneous healing, spontaneous remission, etc. Researchers, scientists, and pharmaceutical companies are in a race to unlock the secrets behind these phenomena because imagine the good it can do if we can regularly replicate it.

But as of now, there are no firm or absolute explanations for it. We have yet to pinpoint its underlying mechanism. Some theorize that the immune system might play a role, others have appealed to the power of belief to create mind-bending realities. But the multiplicity of our theories betrays our tenuous grasp of what’s going on. At least, we don’t understand it enough to “bottle it” and distribute it to everyone.

And so I’m afraid spontaneous healing will remain one of the medical mysteries we will grapple with in the years to come.

And we have only scratched the surface here. There’s a slew of medical mysteries that we need to wrap our heads around. That said, the state of your health and that of your loved ones need not be a mystery. You can objectively know the state of your health. You can know your blood sugar levels or your cholesterol values. You can have a complete blood count and get a gauge for your well-being.

BloodWorks Lab offers different packages just for that purpose. We’re your one-stop shop for all your blood test needs, performing a broad range of medical screenings and assessments.

Bloodworks Lab, as a premier medical testing facility, is also proud to be the first in the country to offer the Anti Acetylcholine Receptor (lgG) Antibody Test and the Anti N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor (Anti NMDA Receptor) Antibody Test.

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