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Deteriorating Tissue Impacts

Understanding how long a zombie can remain mobile is critical to surviving an outbreak. The types of mobility are discussed on the Motor Skills page.

This is an article to address at which point the Z will no longer be a viable threat because it's unable to bite, move, grab, etc.

Deteriorating Tissue Impacts - Prepare for the Z invasion!
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Bones aren't enough to provide movement. At what point will tissue deteriorate enough to stop a zombie from moving? For instance, would this thing be able to move?

Doesn't seem like it could!

The seemingly obvious answer is when the muscle tendons have deteriorated to a point where either they are no longer attached to the bones, or no longer strong enough to move the bones, and therefore unable to move the body along with it. How long this would take will be dependant on several factors:
  • How large the muscles were to begin with (this will vary from cadaver to cadaver)
  • The environment the Zombie is in. (Hot, humid areas will allow for greater decay than cold areas, but Zombies are also highly susceptible to freezing). - Zellgen
  • The amount of physical damage inflicted on the Zombie by humans trying to resist infection, rats or other animals attempting to feed from the Zombies, or in defence of it's territory, or damage done to the Zombie by itself whilst trying to reach food (Zombies do not attempt to self-preserve their bodies).
  • Zombies could also be slowed down from lack of hand-eye coordination, also the virus could slow down the rotting process therefore letting them continue unliving longer or possibly forever. If this is the case my best advice is shoot em in the kneecap and run like hell. - Colmo

Another factor in how fast they deteriorate is their oxygen intake.
  • If Zack doesn't need oxygen, here is a quote from HowStuffWorks.com on muscles to say that he does "If you are going to be exercising for more than a couple of minutes, your body needs to get oxygen to the muscles or the muscles will stop working." Your muscles will start to die from lack of oxygen.
  • If Zack managed to get past the need of oxygen to move, what about the energy required to move? Aerobic respiration is the "process of obtaining energy through the oxidation of organic molecules that form the food, the presence of free oxygen. The maintenance of the organism's life is only possible by the liberation of the chemical energy accumulated in food." So if Zack wants to move for a while before his body starts to decay like a person dying of starvation, he will need oxygen. -Spraymachine

Spraymachine i might have an answer for your question.
  • The reason that the muscles would stop working if they don't get sufficiant oxygen is because the brain sends signals to the muscles in question telling them to stop workingso they don't cause damage to themselves.
  • But a zombies brain would not bother sending the signal at all meaning the muscles would continue to work afterwards but would cause themselves damage how significant the damage would be i don't really know but it can't be too much at a time. - ReverantFaun


It seems that how they move will change based on deterioration, soft tissue rots first so the groin, the inner arms, the face, and other places like that will rot before anything else so lets say the groin rots to nothing the zombie will probably start to move with their legs closer together which would cause less balence,it seems that in good conditions for mold to grow the zed would be imobile within a few weeks, I say days but the movement would keep bugs from eating it which is where most of the dead animals we see go.



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Latest page update: made by ReverantFaun , Jul 8 2008, 9:02 AM EDT (about this update About This Update ReverantFaun Edited by ReverantFaun

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woody100 no! 3 Aug 12 2008, 8:06 AM EDT by NoxTerran
Thread started: Aug 11 2008, 12:57 PM EDT  Watch
as long as they had people to eat they wouldnt rot because, if they can see you, hear you, smell you, then surely there immune system would work because to have senses they must have alot of brain function.
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Renegade13 Decay? 1 Jul 7 2008, 7:29 PM EDT by ReverantFaun
Renegade13
Thread started: May 30 2008, 11:51 PM EDT  Watch
If an outbreak were to happen could we throw stuf on the zeds to make them decay faster?
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dooran Sunlight 0 Jun 1 2008, 7:29 PM EDT by dooran
dooran
Thread started: Jun 1 2008, 7:29 PM EDT  Watch
As much as I disagree with the assertion that zombies are dead, I will concede that point for the sake of the following theory:

When you go out into sunlight, the UV rays will cause a sunburn with enough exposure. When human skin is burned, the immune system goes about dealing with the dead, burned cells, and new un-burned cells begin to grow.

Now, since zombies were human, it is reasonable to asume that their cells will recieve similar effects from UV exposure. Also, sinc they are "dead" then the immune system will not go about dealing with the burn, and no new cells will be produced. This esentially means that the burn just gets worse and worse until the burned skin just falls off, and the process continues on the inner tisues. There is also the possibility of infection causeing more damage to the zombies body.

Now, this raises 2 interesting questions:
1. Does the exposure to sunlight result in accelerated cell death and destruction of the zombie's body?
2. Will the possibility of such a situation result in zombies becoming solely nocturnal?

I certainly hope to God that both of those statements are true...if so, then we would be reasonably safe during the daytime.
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bundy747 decay 3 Mar 20 2008, 4:41 PM EDT by DustinEchos104
bundy747
Thread started: Nov 3 2007, 4:30 AM EDT  Watch
Holding out for 2 weeks hoping for decay to take care of the zombies should be taken very cautiously. Some have speculated that In addition to lack of pain, loss of some senses and the heightening of other senses that the zombie virus also slows down decomposition to a rate so minimal that it would take months or even years for decay to slow or completely stop a zombie from functioning.
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DMfromhell Rigor Mortis 0 Feb 25 2008, 4:59 PM EST by DMfromhell
DMfromhell
Thread started: Feb 25 2008, 4:59 PM EST  Watch
The only problem is that, after initial decomposition, rigor mortis looses its effect, and ceases to be a factor after about 3 days.
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