When a man looks at an attractive, beautifully built woman, the effect can be compared to pure alchemy: meat turns to stone.

One of the directors of the Department of Sexual Health and Medicine at one of the leading medical schools at Cornell University explains the scientific facts behind lust at first glance.

Your insula says, “Oh, yes!”

The moment your gaze falls on her scantily clad body, millions of light receptors in the eye send a mental image to the insula, the part of the brain responsible for perception and emotion. As soon as the image arrives, the insula automatically calculates what your erotic possibilities are with it.

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Dopamine includes a lust switch

Your brain responds to insulin stimuli by secreting dopamine, a neurotransmitter responsible for lust. But if you are under stress, expect a biochemically cold shower: your adrenal glands will start secreting fight-or-run hormones, which will cancel the effect of dopamine.

An erection order has been sent

Dopamine helps signals from the brain to descend through the spinal cord and reach the penis along nerve fibres. Here, at the Erection Headquarters, the nerves receive a signal that triggers them to release acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter that commands blood vessels to produce nitric oxide. It hits your blood in the head.

Your penis has two chambers, both filled with spongy tissue. Nitric oxide dilates blood vessels in this spongy tissue, so blood flow increases up to eight times compared to rest. The result is such a strong increase in pressure in the penis that it defies gravity.

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The sponge becomes a stone

As the tissue in the spongy tissue expands, so does the pressure on the surrounding veins, which prevents blood from flowing. In a full erection, 60 ml of blood can be found in the penis. Of course, this does not last forever, after you experience an orgasm, or lose sight of it – the effect stops.