Adrenaline Trivia
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59 free Adrenaline trivia questions with answers — science & nature quiz, new questions added Sep 2026.
This adrenaline trivia quiz covers the hormone behind every racing heart. It begins with the biology: the glands above the kidneys, the medulla and its chromaffin cells, the amino acids and enzymes that build the molecule, the alpha and beta receptors it binds to, and what it does to your pupils, heart, liver and pancreas when Walter Cannon's fight-or-flight response kicks in. Then it turns to history: Oliver and Schäfer's 1895 extract, John Abel's 'epinephrine', Jokichi Takamine's 1901 patent and the Parke-Davis trademark that explains why Americans and Britons use different names. The second half is medicine and culture: anaphylaxis and where to jab an EpiPen, the Mylan price scandal, croup, glaucoma and cardiac arrest, pheochromocytoma, James Black's beta blockers and the archers who abuse them, adrenochrome and its conspiracy theories, Crank, and what exactly makes an adrenaline junkie. About a third of the questions are easy; the rest suit medical students and pub quiz regulars. Our human body and hormones quizzes go wider. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on adrenaline, the adrenal gland, anaphylaxis and related topics, and each explanation adds one more detail.
30 of 59 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Because 'Adrenalin' was a registered trademark in the US, American medicine adopted which generic name for the hormone?
Epinephrine
Epinephrine became the US generic name because a drug firm was already selling the hormone as Adrenalin. Britain kept adrenaline, so one hormone still goes by two names.
Q 02A few neurons in which part of the brain, the one that controls heartbeat and breathing, also make adrenaline?
The medulla oblongata
The medulla oblongata, at the base of the brainstem, holds a small cluster of adrenaline-making neurons that help control the circulation. The adrenal glands still supply almost all the adrenaline in the blood.
Q 03Where in the body are the suprarenal glands?
Above the kidneys
Above the kidneys, one perched on each, yet they are not part of the urinary system. They belong to the hormone system and simply share the kidneys' address.
Q 04Adrenaline is often credited for 'hysterical strength', as in the classic tale of a mother lifting what off her trapped child?
A car
A car is the usual object, and a few real cases exist: in 2006 an Arizona man raised a Camaro off a trapped cyclist. Science can't test it, since no lab can make volunteers believe they are about to die.
Q 05The outer cortex of the adrenal gland produces which class of chemical messenger?
Steroids
Steroids are the cortex's product, every one of them built from cholesterol. The gland's core works almost as a separate organ and makes adrenaline instead.
Q 06What name is given to the adrenaline-producing cells at the core of the adrenal gland?
Chromaffin
Chromaffin cells are named for their affinity for chromium: chromium salts stain them brown, which makes them stand out under a microscope.
Q 07Adrenaline and dopamine are both built from which amino acid, first isolated from cheese?
Tyrosine
Tyrosine takes its name from 'tyros', the Greek for cheese, where the chemist Justus von Liebig found it in the 1840s. The body turns it into dopamine, then noradrenaline, then adrenaline.
Q 08A surge of adrenaline after a sudden shock or loss is thought to cause which temporary heart condition?
Broken heart syndrome
Broken heart syndrome, or takotsubo cardiomyopathy, mimics a heart attack even though the coronary arteries are clear. Doctors think stress hormones briefly stun the heart muscle, and most people recover fully.
Q 09Chemically, how does adrenaline differ from noradrenaline?
It has an extra methyl group
It has an extra methyl group, which an enzyme in the adrenal core adds to noradrenaline. That enzyme is boosted by stress hormones seeping in from the gland's outer layer.
Q 10Adrenaline, noradrenaline and dopamine belong to which family of compounds?
Catecholamines
Catecholamines survive only a few minutes in the blood before enzymes break them down, so the adrenal glands must keep topping up the supply for as long as an alarm lasts.
Q 11Adrenaline exerts its effects by binding to which two classes of receptor?
Alpha and beta
Alpha and beta were the names Raymond Ahlquist gave the two receptor types in 1948. His idea later gave drug designers their target for the beta blockers.
Q 12Which physiologist first described the fight-or-flight response during the 1910s?
Walter Cannon
Walter Cannon set the idea out in a 1915 book. As a medical student in the 1890s he had turned the newly discovered X-rays on animals to watch how they swallow.
Q 13Which term did the physiologist behind 'fight or flight' coin for the body's tendency to keep its internal conditions stable?
Homeostasis
Q 21Which body system does the fight-or-flight response slow down to free up energy for the muscles?
The digestive system
The digestive system is put on hold, since a meal can wait when a threat cannot. Once the danger passes, the opposing 'rest and digest' response switches it back on.
Q 22The chemist who patented Adrenalin helped give Washington, D.C. which famous gift in 1912?
Cherry blossom trees
Cherry blossom trees came to Washington after Jokichi Takamine offered 2,000 of them in 1909. That first shipment arrived infested with insects and had to be burned, so Tokyo sent 3,020 replacements.
Q 23Before its first synthesis in 1904, where did medical adrenaline come from?
Animal glands
Homeostasis is why you shiver when cold and sweat when hot: the body senses the drift and pulls itself back. Blood sugar and water are held steady in the same way.
Q 14What happens to the pupils during the fight-or-flight response?
They dilate
They dilate, which lets in more light for a sharper view. Eye surgeons borrow the effect, using adrenaline to keep the pupil wide during operations.
Q 15Which part of the heart, its natural pacemaker, does adrenaline act on to raise cardiac output?
The SA node
The SA node is a small cluster of cells that sets the pace of every heartbeat. A medical student, Martin Flack, first spotted it in 1906 in the heart of a mole.
Q 16What effect does adrenaline have on insulin secretion by the pancreas?
It inhibits it
It inhibits it, acting through receptors on the pancreas's insulin-making cells. With less insulin about, more sugar stays in the blood as ready fuel.
Q 17Adrenaline acts as a hormone in the blood, but it also does duty as which other kind of chemical messenger?
A neurotransmitter
A neurotransmitter is a chemical that carries a signal from one nerve cell to the next. Adrenaline has only a bit part there, since its close cousin noradrenaline does most of that work.
Q 18As part of the fight-or-flight response, what happens to the blood's ability to clot?
It speeds up
It speeds up, which would curb the bleeding if a fight ended in a wound. The catch comes in people whose arteries are already narrowed, where a bad shock can help to set off a dangerous clot.
Q 19Which almond-shaped part of the brain sounds the alarm that sets off the body's adrenaline response?
The amygdala
The amygdala takes its name from the Greek for almond. When it senses danger it alerts the hypothalamus, the command centre that signals the adrenal glands.
Q 20Which branch of the nervous system, named from the Greek for 'fellow feeling', triggers the adrenaline rush?
Sympathetic
Sympathetic nerves work like a car's accelerator, priming the body for action. Their partner, the parasympathetic branch, is the brake that calms everything down once the danger has passed.
Animal glands were all there was: the hormone was extracted from the adrenals of farm animals such as sheep and oxen. The German chemist Friedrich Stolz made the first synthetic adrenaline in 1904.
Q 24Besides severe allergic reactions, which emergency is injected adrenaline used for?
Cardiac arrest
Cardiac arrest teams inject adrenaline every few minutes to help restart the heart. A British trial of 8,000 patients found it saved more lives, but could not show that more of them recovered well.
Q 25Where should an adrenaline injection be given for a suspected severe allergic reaction?
The outer thigh
The outer thigh takes the drug up quickly, which is why it is preferred to the upper arm. In an emergency the needle can go straight through clothing.
Q 26The electronics inside the Auvi-Q, a rival to the EpiPen, let it do what during an emergency?
Give spoken instructions
Give spoken instructions: a recorded voice talks the user through each step. In a maker-run trial with dummy pens, 85% of untrained adults got every step right, against 20% with an EpiPen trainer.
Q 27Which company raised the price of a two-pack of EpiPens from about $100 to $600 between 2007 and 2016?
Mylan
Mylan bought the rights in 2007 and raised the price year after year. After a public outcry in 2016 it brought out a generic version of its own product at about half the price.
Q 28When Charles Richet gave dogs a second, tiny dose of sea-anemone toxin weeks after the first, what was the result?
Fatal shock
Fatal shock followed, though the same dogs had survived the first dose. Richet named the reaction anaphylaxis, his Greek coinage for the opposite of protection, and it won him the 1913 Nobel Prize.
Q 29Adrenaline is the first-line treatment for anaphylaxis, which in children is most often triggered by what?
Food
Food leads in children, with milk, peanuts and tree nuts the usual culprits. In adults the pattern shifts, and medicines such as antibiotics become the more common cause.
Q 30Adrenaline is often added to local anaesthetics, where it helps the numbness last and stops what?
Surface bleeding
Surface bleeding is cut because adrenaline narrows the small blood vessels nearby. The same squeeze keeps the anaesthetic from being carried away, which is why a dentist's injection lasts so long.