Rhelyn Harder
- Shaking the head to get water out of the ear could cause brain damage
- Small children could be at risk because of the greater amount of acceleration needed to drain the water inside their ear
- Based on Physics, it should not be recommended to anybody when there are other ways to dislodge water from the ear.
After swimming or taking a shower, some people experience water getting trapped inside the ear. The usual reaction of an individual is to shake their head to drain the water inside. A study, however, shows that this could lead to serious health risks, especially for small children.
Researchers from Cornell University say that such force could hypothetically cause brain damage.
“Our research mainly focuses on the acceleration required to get the water out of the ear canal,” says engineering student Anuj Baskota, the first author of a paper being presented this week at the American Physical Society’s Division of Fluid Dynamics annual meeting in Seattle.
With the use of glass tubes and 3D-printed ear canal, researchers tried a gravitational force that ranges 10 times for infant ear sizes which could cause brain damage.
“The critical acceleration that we obtained experimentally on glass tubes and 3D-printed ear canals was around the range of 10 times the force of gravity for infant ear sizes, which could cause damage to the brain.”
Researchers also aim to measure the force needed to dislodge water from an ear. To make this possible the team made glass tubes with different diameters to replicate an actual human ear canal. Using the 3D-printer the researcher patterned their model based on the CT-scanned human head and coated the insides of the glass tube with silane, to approximately match the level of hydrophobicity found in ear canals.
To test how much gravitational force is required to drain the water inside the ear, they inserted water into their glass tubes before dropping the tubes into the spring.
“Results revealed that the critical acceleration to remove the water from the ear canal strongly depends on the volume and the position of trapped liquid inside the tube,” the team explains in an abstract.
“We found that the critical acceleration is on the order of 10 g, which may cause serious damage to the human brain.”
After conducting the experiments, researchers say that children could be at risk because of the greater amount of acceleration needed to drain the water in small-sized tubes. For adults, it is much easier to remove the water inside the ear. But then, based on Physics it should not be recommended to anybody when there were other ways to dislodge water in the ear.
They suggest that instead of shaking the head with force, a person may simply tilt their head on one side or jiggle the earlobe. Others may put some liquids which can alter the surface tension inside the ear.
“From our experiments and theoretical model, we figured out that surface tension of the fluid is one of the crucial factors promoting the water to get stuck in ear canals,” says Baskota.
“Presumably, putting a few drops of a liquid with lower surface tension than water, like alcohol or vinegar, in the ear would reduce the surface tension force allowing the water to flow out.”
The experiments did not involve real people that why it can’t be taken as clinical proof of brain damage. But then, it is noted as preliminary findings.
Though it is not had been proven, the research can still serve as a valid reminder that people should not shake their heads if water stuck inside their ear.
