Zombie Physiology

We know that zombies ingest living flesh. But, what about zombie digestion? Is there zombie urine? Zombie feces? Zombie flatulence? %0D\ %0D\ Do any of the zombie fictions in film, graphic novels/comics, videogames, or novels answer these questions?%0D\ %0D

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• Since they are dead, they are eating flesh not out of biological necessity. It''s a kind of compulsion. Therefore, they do not digest the flesh. They eat until they cannot eat anymore, then they either cut themselves open to remove the accumulated flesh and start over again, or retire.

• OP, was it really necessary to start this disgusting topic? Why can''t we just have a nice zombie discussion?%0D\ %0D\ Zombies in 28 Days Later did actually die of starvation. But they may not be considered zombies by some so much as people infected by the rage virus.

  the cheekster

• R2 is correct. Zombies are re-animated corpses, so their internal organs do not function. Therefore, they cannot digest food and liquids the way a living person would. Once their stomachs are full, they either purge the contents or cut open their abdomens to remove the contents and then they start over.

• I want to know why zombies are in the zeitgeist AT ALL

• Go read Word War Z by Max Brooks. It will answer all your questions and more. Good stuff. \ \ Basically, all that flesh stays in the zombie bellies rotting until they start to decompose and it falls out.

• OK. But what about the zombies in the walking dead? supposedly, they will weaken to the point of immobility if they do not eat. that sugests that they need the sustenance, which begs the question: where does that material go? %0D\ %0D\ also, with respect to the fictions in which the zombies are found to eat out of compulsion or reflext, as opposed to necessity, i''ve never seen a zombie rip open its gut to purge eaten flesh. that flesh has to go somewhere. these movies, novels, etc. never explain that problem. %0D\ %0D\ will the walking dead?%0D

  OP

• r6 -- i haven''t read World War Z. THAT is a satisfying answer.

  OP

• So I take it Zombies really don''t have any need for cook books.

• So everyone doesn''t poop?

  Taro Gomi

• Well, R10--it''s not exactly "poop," but sometimes putrifying flesh does leak out of the rear end as the result of gravity.

• Butterfish has the same effect, r11.

  Sluicing as I type.

• I always figured that since zombies are continuously in a state of decay, they need fresh brains to replenish their decaying flesh-like matter. They don''t have the same biology as humans, exactly (duh) but they do require new cells to rejuvenate them according to the laws of zombie-science.

  http://zombietools.net/accessories/zombie_che_guevara_t_shirt/

• I eat Christine O''Donnell''s excrement.

  R3, the Cheekster (authenticated)

• There are several types of fictional zombies, from the voodoo-type zombie ([italic]White Zombie, Serpent & the Rainbow[/italic]) to chemically reanimated ([italic]Night of the Living Dead[/italic]) to chemically mutated ([italic]Return of the Living Dead[/italic], [italic]Resident Evil[/italic] series, "House of the Dead" video game) to pathogenically mutated ([italic]28 Days Later[/italic], [italic]World War Z[/italic]). Max Brooks, in his book [italic]The Zombie Survival Guide[/italic], defines zombies as pathogenically mutated, that is, the Solanum virus affects a human host, kills it, then takes control of the brain, hence the need for a headshot to kill the zombie.

• And their pussies stink.

  Cherylombie

• If I ever had an opportunity, I would write a public health masters thesis entitled "Theoretical Epidemiology of a Zombie pandemic"

• It''s all here for you OP.

  http://www.zombiecrisis.org/survival_zombies.php

• I left a monster zombie turd in the toilet.

• One of the best parts of ''28 Days Later'' was at the end -- seeing all of the zombies dying on the road in the countryside from starvation, because that''s just what would happen if zombies existed.

• In The Walking Dead the zombies ate a horse. Do they crave any living flesh? I thought it was just humans, and specifically human brains.

• "28 Days Later" does not have zombies. They are humans infected with the "Rage" virus. They can die like any other human.

• [bold]All Life on Earth Could Have Come From Alien Zombies[/bold] Life on Earth could have grown from the broken remains of alien viruses that, although dead, still contained enough information to give rise to new life. Scientists have speculated that life could have come to Earth from space %E2%80%94 a notion called panspermia %E2%80%94 since the 1870s, when Lord Kelvin suggested microbes could have ridden here on a comet or meteor. Others have suggested tiny organisms could cross the galaxy embedded in dust grains, which could be nudged from one planetary system to another by the slight pressure of stars' radiation. However, most astrobiologists think that same radiation spells a death sentence for delicate microbes. "That essentially kills panspermia in the classical sense," said astrobiologist Rocco Mancinelli of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California. But maybe not, says astronomer Paul Wesson, a visiting researcher at the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics in Canada. In an upcoming paper in Space Science Reviews, Wesson argues that even if the actual microbes are dead on arrival, the information they carry could allow life to rise from the charred remains, an idea he calls necropanspermia. "The vast majority of organisms reach a new home in the Milky Way in a technically dead state," Wesson wrote. "Resurrection may, however, be possible." [Continued at link.]

  http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/necropanspermia/

• An episode of Torchwod dealt with this. Can''t remember which one. The character of Owen became one of the living dead and had to purge what he had ingested. It was pretty gross.

• All I know is that to keep ME alive, my followers need to regularly ingest crackers and wine!

  The Zombie Jesus

• Personally I think it would have been awesome to have had Owen go through the hub eating people''s brains. Although wouldn''t Jack be like an all-you-can-eat-forever buffet?

• I think the flesh and brains dissolve by some strange acidic material that the zombies possess due to their bodies mutating, therefore they are always wanting MORE!

  CHANGBANG