Taking humans (and cows) apart – in Google Body

Google Labs’ latest creation (purchase?) is Google Body – a tool which allows anyone to delve into human anatomy in a 3D environment within their web browser. Settings can be manipulated to show or hide the layers of the body, including:

• Skin
• Muscle
• Bones
• Organs
• Blood
• Brain depth (take layers away from the brain)

As shown in the picture on the left we have several of the layers removed and many showing. The body can be rotated on all axes and by using pins, different parts can be labelled automatically.

We’re not here to advocate Google’s tools, however some very interesting things come out of the lab and using Google body (which is free) could be a useful supplement to a quiz, for example using it to take images of the body’s architecture and adding them to questions. Alternatively you could load this up in the teaching space and ask students to correctly identify the areas you point to, adding a pin each time.

And if that’s not good enough, there is also Google Cow – the same thing but moo’ier.

http://bodybrowser.googlelabs.com

Note: You may have to use Google Chrome to view this page and also apply a fix to your OpenGL (which is a bit annoying)