Why is the appendix useless
Your Appendix Isn't Useless, After All
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run your business the appendix gets a
bad rap you probably never even think
about it unless it's the reason you're
doubled over in abdominal pain and for
the most part it gets written off as a
useless organ leftover from our
evolutionary past but even though you
can usually ignore it you've got to give
your appendix some credit because it
might not be as useless as you thought
the appendix has evolved in mammals at
least 29 times which is a pretty good
sign that it does something and back in
2016 an international team of
researchers set out to understand why it
appears so many times they started by
looking at what kinds of things animals
with appendices have in common but first
they had to define what in appendix even
is since the thing we call in appendix
comes in all shapes and sizes across
mammals as a starting point the
researchers defined it as a section of
tissue extending from the cecum the
beginning of the large intestine they
then use computer models to analyze data
on hundreds of mammals they gathered
information about their habitats and
social behavior and of course whether or
not they had an appendix and they
concluded two things the first was that
the appendix has evolved more times than
it's been lost so it must have some kind
of evolutionary advantage and second
after finding high concentrations of
lymph tissue which protects the body
against foreign invaders they concluded
that the appendix is involved in
immunity across mammals and that seems
to be the case for humans as well within
the inner layers of the Appendix we find
all kinds of densely packed immune cells
including T and B cells and natural
killer cells which are all important
parts of your body's immune response but
we also find a reservoir of good gut
bacteria hanging out in there it's the
same type of bacteria that lined the
insides of the intestine creating a
protective barrier against invaders
given its prime position just off the
colon researchers think the appendix
might dish out emergency rations of gut
bacteria in times of crisis like during
cases of extreme diarrhea diarrhea can
flush out your intestines but the
appendix may be able to provide a fresh
population of the gut bacteria that
keeps your digestion on track they say
you don't know what you have until it's
gone and it's true one way to appreciate
the immune function of the appendix
see what happens when it comes out to
study published in 2015
found that patients who contracted a
particular bacterial infection called
Clostridium difficile were twice as
likely to develop a severe infection if
they didn't have an appendix that study
alone doesn't prove that the appendix
prevents infection but it does raise
questions about whether or not surgeons
should remove the appendix when they
don't need to since that might actually
cause trouble rather than prevent it
that said appendicitis can be deadly so
if your appendix needs to come out it's
coming out but otherwise maybe we
shouldn't be so quick to dismiss this
organ that's usually just trying to be a
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[Music]
