mdennin

This is one of the more interesting physics question about dead zombies. Clearly, with no heart beat, there is no blood pressure, and there is no head splatter - and yes, their blood pools. However, zombies are clearly "dead" but with some biological function or they would not even move! So, the real question to me is how much blood pressure are they generating? My impression is that the blood splatter is LESS than one expects from a person, so there blood pressure is there, but somehow less than normal. Also, they often have pretty gaping wounds with no squirting blood, which suggests really low blood pressure.

I like this question a lot. Had not thought of it before, but it is a great combination of physics and biology. The bacteria would definitely generate gasses. The real question is how "closed" their biology really is. One can certainly imagine both plenty of openings in a zombie for gasses to leak out and regions where bacteria and gas is trapped.

An excellent argument except for being clear at the end of the post that the physicist has access to better zombie weapons. The mathematician only has pencils! So, at the end, it is the physicist.

This is a great question that we actually discuss in our round table in the show. Of course, I favor the physics building. No one likes to go there and plenty of supplies for weapon manufacture :)!

We would love to have you in the class - go to http://canvas.net to enroll. We look forward to having you.