Why do tears taste salty?

Body fluids like sweat and tears are salty to taste and this has physiological, immunological and evolutionary significance. Tears are the secretions of lacrymal glands of eyes. These tears are classified into basal, reflex and psychic tears. The salinity and chemical composition of tears vary from type to type and situation to situation. Basal tears are responsible for keeping the cornea of eye moist. Reflex tears are produced during eye irritation. Psychic tears are produced during weeping. Tears contain greater quantities of water along with other organic and inorganic chemical components like mucin, lipids,lysozyme, lactoferrin, lipocalin,lacritin, sodium and potassium. The salinity of tears is attributed to the presence of salts of sodium and potassium. This salinity of tears along with the presence of enzymes like lysozyme is responsible for their antimicrobial activity. Basal tears have a salt content similar to blood plasma. The salinity of basal tears disturbs the osmotic balance of bacteria and keeps the cornea in a healthy microbial-free environment. The mineral content of tears also nourishes the tissues associated with eyes. Saline nature of tears also indicates our evolutionary descent from marine organisms. G.L.N.PRASAD , Head, Department of Zoology, Govt. UG & PG College, Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh

Genitive Case

Genitive case

Genitive case is is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun. It often marks a noun as being the possessor of another noun; however, it can also indicate various other relationships than possession.
Examples:

• Janet’s long fingers, Janet’s jacket, Janet’s drink (relationship indicating possession)
• a wheel of cheese (a relationship indicating composition)
• the love of music (participation in an action)
• men of Rome (origin)
• the capital of the Republic (reference)
• man of honor(description)

Form of genitive case

Genitive case can be indicated by

1. adding 's after the noun (John's brother)
2. adding of before the noun (the end of the movie)

Intensifiers

What are intensifiers?

Words which are used to add force to the meaning of verbs, adjectives or other adverbs are called intensifiers.

Examples of intensifiers

These are examples of intensifiers:

• I strongly disagree.
• It's extremely hot in Africa.
• You play soccer very well.
• Do you really mean it.
• It's fairly interesting.
• It's quite calm here.
• He's pretty intelligent.
• These students are rather noisy.
• I so wanted to buy the dress.
• She writes poems too often.
• It's absolutely amazing.
• I am a little angry with her.

Too / Enough

Too and Enough

Too and enough indicate degree. They are used with adjectives.

• Too means more than what is needed.
• Enough means sufficient.

Examples

He is too old to play football with the kids.
Dave is intelligent enough to do the write thing.
You're not working fast enough
I don't have enough time.
He has too many friends.
She has got too much patience

Use of too and enough

1.Enough precedes adjectives and adverbs:

He isn't old enough to watch this program.
We're not walking quickly enough.

2.Enough may also precede nouns:

We have enough money . 
I have not got enough money to buy this computer.

3.Too comes before adjectives and adverbs:

It's too hot to wear that coat.
I was driving too fast.

Used to, be used to, get used to

Used to

Used to shows that:

• a particular thing always happened or was true in the past.
• But it no longer happens or is no longer true now:

Examples:

• David used to live in Madrid.
• She used to exercise every morning, but since she had that terrible accident she doesn't exercise anymore.
• Why don't you come and see me like you used to?

Forms of used to

Here are the interrogative, affirmative and negative forms of used to

• Did you use to exercise regularly?
• Yes, I used to go jogging nearly everyday.
• No, I didn't use to exercise on a regular basis.

Used to, be used to, get used to

1.Used to shows that a particular thing always happened or was true in the past (see examples above)
2.Be used to is used to say that something is normal, not unusual.
Examples:

• I'm used to living alone.
• Don't worry, John is used to driving for long hours. He has worked as a professional driver for 20 years.