Did you know?
We take an average of 700 million breaths in our lifetime.
We get a completely new body every 2 years.
Our bodies produce 40,000 new skin cells every minute, and each skin cell lives for less than a month.
The food we eat travels a 9-meter journey from our mouth to our anus.
Using microphotography, advanced medical imaging, and cardiac computed tomography (CT) scanning, this film shows the incredible changes our bodies undergo from the moment we are born until our last breath. It captures the continuous progress and continuation of life, revealing a magical journey that every one of us will take, yet may never fully understand.
After watching it, you will feel a sense of enlightenment. You will stand in awe of the greatness of life, and realize that death is an inevitable part of this journey.
The First 20 Years: Miraculous Physical Transformation
At the moment of birth, we become independent beings. Our heart, which has already been beating for 8 months, is no bigger than a walnut, and all our other organs begin to function.
When we are born, our bones are made of cartilage, which allows us to be born safely. Over time, this cartilage hardens to support our bodies, which is why we start crawling around the age of one.
As infants, there is a soft spot between the bones at the top of our heads, which gradually closes as we grow.
From the age of 5, we start forming memories. When we see or hear something new, our brains convert it into electrical impulses. These impulses create connections in the brain, and the stronger these connections are, the longer the memory lasts. Childhood is the period of fastest brain growth and the best time for learning.
During puberty, the hypothalamus in the brain releases specific hormones that cause our sexual organs to mature. These hormones affect both our bodies and our emotions, preparing us for adulthood.
In the first 20 years of our lives, our bodies undergo almost miraculous changes. We grow to nearly 4 times our birth height and 21 times our birth weight. We digest nearly 9 tons of food, our hearts beat over 100 million times, and we take more than 200 million breaths.
The Prime Years: 20-30, Choices That Shape Your Lifetime
Our twenties are the best years of our physical lives. Our bodies are in peak condition from the inside out. As cells constantly grow and die, we get a brand new body every 2 years on average. And the choices we make during this time can affect the rest of our lives!
Exercise
Exercise improves the efficiency of the heart and stimulates the growth of capillaries in the lungs, allowing every alveolus to fill with air. It also puts pressure on bones, prompting bone cells to produce new bone fibers and form stronger bones.
Noise
Although the hair cells in our inner ear are damaged every day from birth, loud noise from parties accelerates this damage. Once these hair cells are broken, they cannot be repaired, gradually reducing our hearing range.
Smoking
Smoking causes black spots to form in the lungs.
Alcohol
Alcohol disrupts the chemical balance of neurons in the brain. The brain mistakes alcohol for water, forcing the kidneys to work harder to metabolize it. The next day, the liver steps in to detoxify the body. This process requires water, and since 75% of the brain is made of water, the liver draws large amounts of water from the brain. This causes the brain to shrink and pull away from the skull, leading to the headache we know as a "hangover".
By the age of 40, collagen in the body breaks down, causing the skin to lose elasticity and form wrinkles. Our eyesight also deteriorates irreversibly, and hormone levels begin to decline.
At the same time, external stress accelerates the aging process. Excessive stress causes the body to secrete large amounts of adrenaline and cortisol, which make muscles contract, arteries narrow, the heart beat faster, and blood pressure rise.
If stress is not relieved, high blood pressure becomes a frequent problem. Repeated high blood pressure accelerates vascular aging, causing the blood vessel walls to harden and thicken. This makes the heart work harder and can even damage blood vessels in the brain, leading to strokes and other common diseases of old age.
After the age of 70, our bodies slow down and our senses continue to decline. The hair cells in the inner ear are almost completely destroyed, leading to gradual hearing loss. Our vision changes as the lens of the eye becomes cloudy and discolored, and our bones become increasingly fragile.
What Is the Essence of Aging?
Physiologically, aging is the entire developmental process of an individual, from the formation of the fertilized egg to death in old age.
The degenerative changes in the structure of tissues and organs and the decline in function that characterize human aging are essentially caused by cellular decline. And cellular decline is primarily caused by the depletion of stem cells.
Therefore, supplementing the body with stem cells to restore cell activity and repair aging tissues and organs is the only way to fundamentally delay aging.
British scientist Anastasia wrote in the journal Nature that stem cells are crucial for the body's self-repair and tissue regeneration, and the reduction of stem cells is the main cause of human aging.
Stem cells decrease in number and lose their regenerative capacity as we age.
In short, the root cause of aging is that the number of new cells is insufficient to completely replace dead cells, and the activity of new cells is insufficient. This leads to a decrease in the total number of cells in the body (causing physical atrophy) and a decline in vitality (causing aging symptoms). Ultimately, it is all caused by the reduction in the number and regenerative capacity of our own stem cells.
As we approach death, endorphins — natural painkillers — flood our bloodstream. Due to lack of oxygen, body tissues stop functioning.
Within 10 seconds, electrical activity in the brain drops sharply.
Within 4 minutes, the brain suffers permanent, irreversible damage. Hearing is the last sense to remain.
It takes 37 hours for brain cells to stop sending nerve impulses, at which point life ends.
All journeys have an end, and the end of the human journey is death.
But the story of life continues even after we die. We live on in the hearts of those who love us. Our children and their children inherit our genes, and carry our memories within them. These are the moments we shared with them on our extraordinary journey of life.