Breathing is something that we all do without usually realizing it. We breathe in and out about 22,000 times a day.
We are powered by breathing. Our lungs fuel us with oxygen, our body's life-sustaining gas. Our lungs breathe in air, then remove the oxygen and pass it through our bloodstream, where it's carried off to the tissues and organs that allow us to walk, talk, and move.
Our lungs also take carbon dioxide from our blood and released it into the air when we breathe out.
Our brain controls how fast our lungs draw in air. When we exercise or play, our brain tells our lungs to work faster. When we’re sleeping or at rest, our lungs slow down.
Our breathing and our lungs are precious. We need to protect them.
Here are a few fun facts about our breathing and lungs:
Your left and right lungs aren’t exactly the same. The lung on the left side of your body is divided into two lobes. The lung on your right side is divided into three. The left lung is also slightly smaller, allowing room for your heart.
Did you know that you can you live with only one lung? Having just one lung limits your physical ability. However it doesn’t stop you from living a relatively normal life.
People who have a large lung capacity can send oxygen around their body faster. You can increase you lung capacity with regular exercise.
When resting, the average adult breathes around 12 to 20 times a minute.
Lungs contain approximately 2,400 kilometres of airways and 300 to 500 million air sacs (alveoli).
If stretched out, the total surface area of lungs would be about the same size as half a tennis court.1
There are about 600 million lung sacs (alveoli) in your lungs. If you stretched all of them out, they would be about the size of four and a half 18-wheelers parked next to each other.
Your lungs are important for talking and singing. Above your trachea (wind pipe) is your larynx (your voice box), which contains your vocal cords. The amount of air you force through them can change the pitch of the sound and also changes the volume of the sound.
