Question about Hypothetical Type of Thermal Injury. Explained

Hi:

I asked this question before but the way I asked obviously made readers
misunderstand my question.

Lets say I was somehow invincible. Totally physically-invincible to all
injuries excluding flame burns to the skin resulting from direct
contact with flames. Lets say that the only molecules affected in my
skin were proteins. Lets say that the denatured proteins in my
thermally-injured skin did not coagulate [somehow the hydrophobic cores
are protected]. Lets say that no inflammatory reaction occurred. Lets
also say that no infection occurred. In addition, nerves, blood
vessels, sweat glands, oil glands, lymph nodes, hair roots, dermal
muscles [e.g. erector muscles under hairs], and hairs are somehow
totally protected from the thermal injury. Lastly, lets also say that
the organic molecules in my skin did not carbonize* [due to protection
of the carbon-carbon bonds as well as the carbon-x bonds; x standing
for the other element attached to carbon].


*carbonize = when an organic substance is heated to a certain
temperature or above in the absence of adequate oxygen [for
oxidization] that substance turns smokes and turns black. It leaves
smoke, char, and ash behind. If heated to a sufficient temperature or
beyond in the PRESENCE of adequate oxygen, the organic substance will
oxidize but not carbonize.


Lets I suffered a flame burn [due to direct contact with open flame]
which totally denatured all proteins molecules in my epidermis and
dermis [excluding nerves, blood vessels, sweat glands, oil glands,
lymph nodes, hair roots, dermal muscles [e.g. erector muscles under
hairs], and hairs]. In addition, no the burn did not extend anywhere
below the dermis [only epidermis and dermis are affected] what symptoms
would I experience? What color would my skin change to?

Here is what I think would happen. I am dark-skinned. I think that my
skin would turn white due to denaturing of the pigment proteins. I am
not sure about how much pain I would feel. Since the nerve endings are
NOT damaged I imagine I would be in excruciating pain. But then once
all the skin cells are totally dead then they would stop secreting
chemicals that would stimulate my nerve endings. Would this stop the
pain? After all, dead cells can't secrete the substances necessary to
cause pain.

The question about pain confuses me. As far as color, as I said before,
I think the injured skin would appear white. Not red because blood
vessels are not affected and in addition, there is no inflammatory. Not
black, because there is no carbonization.

Note: I have no actual application for this question. I am just in it
for the science.

Any assistance would be appreciated


Thanks,

Radium

Radium wrote:

Let's say that Mr. Invincible fell into a black hole... Out he cannot
get.

I have a mate who suffered a brachial plexus lesion after an accident,
and when the arm withered went for voluntary amputation.

the amputation saved the hassle of the awkward bit of "baggage"
attached to his right shoulder and always getting in the way.

the amputation made no difference whatsoever to the pain, which is
considerable.

his SO is a senior medical person here (UK) so he always had the best
treatments and cutting edge stuff, just last year or so "they" (meaning
doctors and consultants) accepted, as a result of completely new tests,
that the pain he was feeling was in fact "real" pain and not "phantom"
pain, as pretty much 99.999% of doctors prior to these tests
insisted... "it's all in your head"

I'm not a doctor or bio-chemist or chemist, but it seems to me that
there is something in the bio-chemical nature of the nervous system
that.

a/ once a nervous system matures, permamently remembers that neural
map, so that no matter what happens to it, it remembers what it should
be like.

b/ once a severe trauma occurs, it permanently remembers the last
signal sent, and nothing but a subsequent "all is well" signal from an
original subnet that matches the "remembered" neural map will turn it
off.

I can see the survival benefit, major injury, do not use limb until it
heals, healing = signals returning from limb return to normal state,
this makes a much simpler feedback system that one that monitors
progress incrementally.

so basically I wouldn't bet you tuppence that your dead cells would
stop hurting until you apply some miracle stem cell replacement skin
salve...

Guy Fawkes wrote:

I thought "phantom pain" was real -- actual signals being sent
along actual nerves which no longer end where they used to.
The signals just don't originate where the brain is interpreting
them as originating. But the signals are really there, nevertheless.
Sort of like injecting a packet into a network with a fake
originating IP address.

I never heard phantom pain called psychosomatic.

- Randy

In article <[Only registered users see links. ]>,
Robert <[Only registered users see links. ]> wrote:

Consider a spherical vampire with radius R ...
--
Ian York ([Only registered users see links. ]) <http://www.panix.com/~iayork/>
"-but as he was a York, I am rather inclined to suppose him a
very respectable Man." -Jane Austen, The History of England

"Radium" <[Only registered users see links. ]> wrote in message
news:1134624719.649989.163920@f14g2000cwb.googlegr oups.com...

Like I said last time - green

Why green

Bob wrote:


Okay but what other symptoms would occur? Would the skin texture
change? If so, how?

Lets add another rule. What if no scarring can occur?

How would the injured skin look in the time that the burn has just
occured [i.e. a fresh burn]?

How would the injured skin look like in about two hours after the burn?

In a day after the burn?

A week?

"Radium" <[Only registered users see links. ]> wrote in message
news:1134801114.531276.250570@z14g2000cwz.googlegr oups.com...


Seriously - why not ?

"Manky Badger" <spam@puritanDOTfreeserve.FULLSTOPcoSPOTuk> wrote in message
news:do0eqm$cmq$[Only registered users see links. ].pol.co.uk...

Green is a secondary color. It is a composite of blue and yellow.
If Spiderman were to be burnt then his skin which is normally blue would
appear green. That meets the criteria for Superman and Batman also. I agree
with Manky on this.