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>If you do have a good sensor for that gel, and you know what to measure in the
>gel that correlates well with DCI, why not just point that sensor at the
>diver? Better yet, if whales are particularly resistant to DCI, there must
>conversely be an animal particularly subject to DCI. So you get yourself a
>hamster and one of those clear plastic balls they run around in, and some
>silicone sealant..... ;-)
It's an idea that has come of age; if you are prepared to wear a kangaroo
rat in a box on your wrist that is...
Hills BA, Butler BD (1978) The kangaroo rat as a model for type I
decompression sickness. Undersea Biomedical Research 5:309-321
This study involved 720 exposures of 70 kangaroo rats trapped in West Texas
and showed that decompression-induced tail biting in this animal provides a
good animal model for marginal limb bends in man. That this phenomenon can
be reversed by recompression and pathological examination of the tail both
indicated that a similar mechanism is probably involved in kangaroo rats and
humans. Quantitatively, the most susceptible 20% of kangaroo rats can
reproduce the no-stop decompression limits for man for exposure times
ranging from 5 min to 8 h, for both air and helium-oxygen. Even the average
minimum no-tail-biting depth of 46.2 fsw (2.40 ATA) for this species is much
closer to the minimum bends depth of man than to the equivalent depth for
other animals of its size, and is as good as the goats'. Its size and habits
make the kangaroo rat much more convenient than other animals to use as a
model for marginal decompression sickness, and particularly attractive
economically for testing long helium-oxygen schedules and other means of
decompression sickness prevention.
/rat
___________________________________________________________________________
shelps@ac*.ma*.ad*.ed*.au*|Stephen Helps PhD Ack! ___/|
FAX (08)232-3283 |Anaesthesia & Intensive Care \O.o|
Voice (08)224-5495 |University of Adelaide =(___)=
|ADELAIDE, 5005, South Australia U
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Franklin's Rule: Blessed is the end user who expects nothing, for they will
not be disappointed.
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