• Question: How many cells are there in the body?

    Asked by anthayward to Alex, Amy, Andy, Georgia, Ollie on 17 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Amy Reeve

      Amy Reeve answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      Hi

      I am not sure how many cells there are in the body, billions of billions i would say. I do know thought that there are as many cells in your brain as there are stars in the universe. if this is in just one organ i imagine the final number is phenomenal!! 🙂

    • Photo: Andy MacLeod

      Andy MacLeod answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      Lots and lots. Billions and billions.

      Hello again anthayward. The cells in our body are constantly replenishing themselves as old cells die and new ones form, so estimates vary, but most seem to be around 10 to the power 14. Which is 100 TRILLION. Which is: 100,000,000,000,000

      If you were to count from 1 up to that number, it would take you more than 3 million years! So yeah, lots. 😀

    • Photo: Georgia Campbell

      Georgia Campbell answered on 17 Jun 2011:

      As Amy and Andy have said, there will be billions of cells in a human body – I think the reason that we don’t know the exact number is that everybody will have different numbers of cells though – this could be determined by your genes, and how aften they programme your cells to divide as you grow. It will probably change over the course of your life too, depending on how many of your cells die, and how many are replaced!

      Interestingly, there are model arganisms where we know exactly how many cells they have – these are called C Elegans, and are a type of very very small worm (so the number of cells is much easier to look at!). There are 959 somatic cells in the adult hermaphrodite, and 1031 in the adult male – another interesting fact about this species is that there is no true female! We have mapped exactly what each one of these cells does as C Elegans develop 🙂

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