The typical human bite exerts 162 PSI, however this is little compared to the jaw strength of some of nature’s champions.
Bites can be as powerful as the animal’s jaw muscles, jawbone, and tooth surface area allow, but also on how big its lunch is. According to research out of Brown University, the bite force of an animal is proportional to the size of the object it is biting since the force in a muscle depends on how much it is stretched.
Correct Unit of MeasurementÂ
The pressure exerted by a bite is expressed in pounds per square inch (psi). The correct unit of measurement is pounds per square inch (lbf/in2), which is the pressure exerted by a weight of one pound when applied to an area of one square inch (6.5 square centimeters). In other words, the force with which the animal assaults its unfortunate meal.
The human jaw muscles must contract by forty pounds in order to deliver an aten-pound bite. The jaws are designed like a pair of tongs, with the power source located at the joint and the job being done at the other end of the jaw levers. Comparing chewing to biting is like comparing apples to oranges.
Gnathodynamometer
Dr. G. E. Black, president of the Chicago Dental University, developed the gnathodynamometer, a basic apparatus that puts the average jaw to a harsh test, some time ago in order to estimate the average strength of the jaws. More than a thousand people’s jaws were measured by this device for gnathody-namometric purposes.
Based on data from 1,000 people, we know that molar teeth, on average, weigh 171 pounds, while bicuspids and incisors weigh substantially less. Only seventeen people out of a total of a thousand generated enough force to fill the instrument’s complete registry, which weighed 275 pounds. In his most recent article, Dr. Black has compiled data on roughly fifty people who were gnathodynamometer tested.
Everyone from a blacksmith to a Chinese laundryman to a servant girl is represented on this list. Docent in the field of music. Among the patients on the list, the butcher demonstrated a power of just 165 pounds with his teeth, suggesting that he is used to selecting tender meats for use on his own table. A printer registered 270 pounds (though any compositor will tell you that printers’ pie is no easy feat), while a dentist came in second at 240. The highest weight achieved by a woman was 160 pounds, and the lowest was 45.
Last Words
The latter record was set by a little girl who, for some reason, was able to measure 70 pounds using only her incisors. This could be because she had trained the dental membranes in her front teeth to withstand more force by, say, biting a pencil. According to these statistics, men bit off an average of 150 pounds with their molars and only 83 pounds with their incisors, while women bit off an average of 108 pounds with their molars and only 57 pounds with their incisors.
