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Body Composition

Analyzing body composition can help to provide valuable information about a person’s overall current health as well as how that changes overtime.  In this series, students hear from a registered dietitian as she discusses a variety of ways that are available to analyze and assess a patient’s body composition and how physics plays an important role in doing so. Homework and lab activities focus on the following topics:
  • buoyancy
  • free body diagrams
  • universal gas law
  • AC circuits
  • impedance
  • x-rays
  • photons
  • underwater weighing
  • DEXA
  • BIA
  • calorimetry
  • air displacement
  • plethysmography



​In the video series above, Registered Dietitian Kate Haas provides students with a brief overview of the many different ways to look at body composition as well as discusses the different models and when to use them.  She explains how a variety of techniques are used to assess body composition and how their use may vary based on cost, accuracy, and availability of electricity.
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