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Asked by to Anna, Elaine, Fiona, Kevin, Darren on 23 Jun 2014. This question was also asked by .
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Elaine Cloutman-Green answered on 23 Jun 2014:
Most of the time we sweat it’s to allow us to control our body temperature (thermoregulation). Sweat produces moisture on our skin that then evaporates cooling us down. Some people do sweat more than others though and there are conditions that can cause you to sweat more frequently.
Sweating can also be triggered by hormones, especially during the menopause and by things like stress which can affect your hormones.
We sweat through sweat glands, Eccrine glands that are located pretty much all over the body and Apocrine glands that are in your arm pits and groin. They secrete sweat which is made up of water, salt and waste such as urea.
Some diseases also cause you to sweat more as if you have excess urea your body can try and get rid of it via your sweat glands.
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Kevin O'Dell answered on 25 Jun 2014:
Following on from Elaine’s answer, human sweat is quite different from the sweat of other mammals, even the other apes. It’s very watery. But why?
The idea is that as our ancestors evolved on the Africa plains, they developed the ability of language which enabled them to organise complex hunting groups. These early humans would hunt stealthily for many hours under the hot sun. They would also sweat a lot, but as those of you that have dogs know, when a hairy animal sweats a very thick sweat, the coat gets matted and the animals can’t cool down. So early humans evolved to avoid this by losing their hair (the naked ape) and having very watery sweat. We retain the hair on our heads because it stops our brains from cooking.
At least that is the theory!
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