Tears Under A Microscope Show They Too Imprint Our Emotions [Gallery]

Though many people may not consider it, one of the best example people express their emotions is through tears. Most tears are usually associated with sadness, like Selena Gomez when Justin Bieber left her. However, sadness is not exclusive to producing an excess amount of water in one’s eyes. For example, the Inquisitr reported on a mourning wife expressing tears of gratitude for a firefighter’s good deed for her.

However, there was a question among the science community that came up about tears and it was if tears are different or all the same depending on emotion. To some, tears are tears but for others, they just had to know and what they found out says a lot about how tears also express human emotion.

According to RYOT, tears are an expression that sprout out from a broad range of emotions. As stated earlier, most tears are associated with sorrow and pain, but they can also be made through laughter, joy, and happiness. Tears of sorrow and tears of physical pain (poked in the eye for example) are different because of the reason of said tears, just like tears of joy, tears of laughter, and even tears of deep-felt indescribable emotion (watch the ending of A Little Princess for example) are different. However, are they different on a chemical level?

Wired also reported about if tears are different on a chemical level due to emotions by citing photographer Rose-Lynn Fisher. According to the report, Fisher was going through a rough time in her life in which she lost a couple of people close to her while her own life was in a period of flux. As a result of said circumstances, she was crying a lot. It would be that one day, she decided not to wipe her tears away but wondered what they’d look like under a microscope. Fisher even related the idea to an experiment.

“You know that classic science experiment where they show us all the life that’s present in one drop of pond water? Well I wanted to find out what was present in one tear.”

What started as a wonder because of a hard time in her life because the primary basis behind Rose-Lynn Fisher’s study of 100 tears through a standard-light telescope known as The Topography of Tears. Over time, Fisher would photograph and document three types of tears: basal (lubricating), reflex (responsive to an irritant), and weeping tears (emotional). She would soon discover that emotions alter the chemistry of water, hormones, minerals, and other compounds during a cry.

“The project began in a period of personal change, loss, and copious tears. The random compositions I find in magnified tears often evoke a sense of place, like aerial views of emotional terrain.”

A gallery of different kinds of tears under the microscope is provided below. Some are quite cool-looking while others are eerie — but overall, the fact that tears change with emotion and purpose are amazing.

Now that you seen the gallery of different tears under the microscope, what are your views about them? Do you find them beautiful, weird, or cool? Was their makeup something you didn’t expect?

[Post images via Rose-Lynn Fisher Website]