Team Human: Deep Body Science Exploration
Team Human
The Biological Systems Puzzle
Eleven interlocking human figures. Each one represents a different biological system — the team that keeps you alive, moving, thinking, and healthy.
About the Puzzle
A Human Body, Piece by Piece
The human body runs 11 biological systems simultaneously, every second of every day, without you thinking about it. Team Human gives each system its own figure — bold and gestural — and locks them together the way the systems themselves interlock: none of them works without the others.
The 11 Systems
Meet Every Figure
206 bones form the scaffold that holds everything up. Bone is living tissue — you have a completely new skeleton roughly every 10 years. Hidden inside this figure: vertebrae and femur shapes.
Over 600 muscles power every move you make — from the massive gluteus maximus to the tiny stapedius in your ear. Reading these words uses 12 muscles just to move your eyes. Hidden: striated fibre patterns.
Your skin — the body's largest organ, about 2 m² and up to 4 kg — is a waterproof, self-repairing barrier that renews itself every 27 days. This figure forms the outer boundary of the puzzle. Hidden: microscopic pore patterns at the edges.
Your heart beats ~100,000 times per day — about 3 billion times in a lifetime. Blood vessels laid end-to-end would circle Earth twice. Hidden: branching veins and a heart node in the figure's chest.
About 22,000 breaths per day, every day, without thinking. The lungs' 480 million alveoli create a gas-exchange surface that — unfolded — would cover half a tennis court. Hidden: bronchial tree silhouette.
Nine metres of digestive tract coil into your torso. 100 trillion gut microbes help break down food, produce vitamins, and communicate with your brain via the gut–brain axis. Hidden: intestinal spiral in the torso.
Two kidneys filter your entire blood supply every 30 minutes, processing ~180 litres of fluid per day to produce 1–2 litres of urine. They regulate blood pressure and pH balance around the clock. Hidden: kidney bean silhouettes in the lower back.
86 billion neurons, each connected to thousands of others — more connections than stars in the Milky Way. Nerve signals travel at up to 120 m/s, faster than a Formula 1 car. Hidden: synapse sparks where fingertips meet.
Glands throughout the body — thyroid, adrenal, pancreas — release hormones that travel via the bloodstream to trigger reactions far away. Adrenaline floods your system in milliseconds. Hidden: hexagonal hormone symbols floating around the figure.
White blood cells identify, tag, and destroy invaders — bacteria, viruses, rogue cells. The immune system remembers: once you've defeated a pathogen, it keeps the blueprint ready. That's what vaccines exploit. Hidden: Y-shaped antibodies in the raised arms.
The system that connects generations, copying the DNA blueprint with an error rate of less than one mistake per billion base pairs. In the puzzle, two figures interlock most tightly here. Hidden: DNA helix motifs threading between the pair.
How They Work Together
Three Roles, Eleven Systems
No system works alone. Your body runs all three of these roles simultaneously, every second of your life.
The Foundation
These systems give your body its physical presence — a scaffold to hold you upright, engines to move you through the world, and an outer layer that keeps everything in and the outside world out.
The Supply Chain
These four systems keep the body fuelled, oxygenated, and clean — running continuously, largely without your conscious input, 24 hours a day, every day of your life.
The Command Network
These systems communicate, coordinate, defend, and ultimately connect one generation to the next. The nervous system works in milliseconds; the endocrine system works over hours and days. Together, they run the show.
Body by the Numbers
Four Numbers That'll Blow Your Mind
3 billion heartbeats in a lifetime
Your heart beats about 100,000 times every day — never stopping, never resting. Over an average lifetime, that's roughly 3 billion beats. The circulatory system is the only system that literally never takes a break.
120 metres per second
The fastest nerve signals in the body travel at up to 120 m/s. Formula 1 cars top out around 80 m/s. Your nervous system has been faster than the world's fastest racing car since the day you were born.
New skin every 27 days
The outer layer of your skin completely replaces itself roughly every 27 days. Over your lifetime, you'll wear about 1,000 different suits of skin. The one you have today didn't exist a month ago.
100 trillion gut microbes
The microbes living in your digestive system outnumber your own body cells. They help digest food, produce vitamins B and K, and send chemical signals to your brain that influence how you feel. You are a team — even at the microbial level.
At Telus Spark
Find the Science in the Building
Telus Spark has exhibits that connect directly to what's inside this puzzle. After you've assembled Team Human, go find them.
Spark's outdoor active-play space looks like a playground — and it is. But while you climb, balance, and jump, your Nervous, Muscular, and Skeletal systems are all firing at once. Your brain is sending signals at up to 120 m/s just to keep you on your feet. Brainasium is Team Human in action.
Yes, the water is safe to drink — and yes, it was recently a toilet. This exhibit is a vivid illustration of the Urinary and Digestive systems at work: the body's constant loop of intake, processing, and output. Your kidneys handle their version of this cycle every 30 minutes.
Team Human is an invitation to ask why. Why does the heart never rest? Why does skin grow back? How does a vaccine work? Spark's science floor has hands-on exhibits that dig into all of it — and the educators there love a curious question.
Go Deeper
For Curious Adults & Helpers
The Gut–Brain Axis
Your digestive system communicates with your brain via the vagus nerve and a flood of chemical signals. What you eat influences how you feel — and vice versa. The 100 trillion microbes in your gut are having a conversation with your nervous system right now.
How Vaccines Work
Vaccines exploit the immune system's memory. They introduce a harmless version of a pathogen — just enough for the immune system to learn it. When the real threat arrives, the response is fast, targeted, and ready. No trial run needed.
Nervous vs. Endocrine
Two very different communication systems, working together. The nervous system uses electrical signals in milliseconds. The endocrine system uses hormones in the bloodstream over minutes, hours, or days. Your hypothalamus bridges both — a brain region that directly controls hormone-producing glands.
Spark × StumpCraft Science Series
Every Body Is a Team
The same synergy that locks 50 puzzle pieces together is what keeps 11 biological systems running in perfect concert — 24 hours a day, for your entire life. Assemble the team. Discover the science inside every figure.