A few years ago, I remember seeing an experiment where a lab rat was put into a large flask of a thick, clear fluid and it could breathe normally. Does anyone else remember this? Or better yet, why were they doing this?
In the movie The Abyss there was a rat who actually did this. It was faked for the people, though. Check out the imdb link and read about it in the trivia section.
I remember seeing a segment of “The Mike Douglas Show” sometime in the late 60s/early 70s (ye gads, I feel ancient) where someone (no idea who) was demonstrating ‘breathable liquid’.
He tied a weight to a mouse’s tail and put the mouse into a container of ‘water’, so that the mouse was completely submerged, just out of paw’s reach of the surface. The mouse struggled for a moment and was absolutely still. The mouse was under’water’ for awell over a minute, IIRC. (MD commented to the effect that the mouse looked dead.) The guy took the mouse out of the liquid and placed it back on the table, nudged it, and it started moving again.
I do not remember why this liquid was developed, but I do remember him saying that it would cost over $100,000 to fill an average swimming pool (I don’t recall the dimensions) with this liquid.
I thought I was the only one who remembered this. I always wondered what happened to this and if the idea/product was ever further developed.
Yeah, it’s pretty old technology now though. The liquid was a halogenated hydrocarbon compound that was capable of having huge anounts of oxygen dissolved in it, yet with far less affinity than haemoglobin. The technology has practical applications in exceptionally deep free diving. Basically water pressure at depth prevents the lungs from expanding, so to counter this you have to use pressurised gases. At extreme depths this causes all sorts of nasty physiological problems, so using breathable liquids has its benefits. The problem is that although the technology works quite well it is apparently such a disgusting feeling when first overcoming the gag reflex to try to breathe liquid that no-one is willing to undergo the process twice for love or money.
The technology was used as a plot device in the movie ‘The Abyss’
As a side note the echidna is the only mammal capable of breathing water. The interesting shoulder structure gives it the ability to drive water in and out of it’s lungs efficiently, and if placed in cold oxygenated water it will breathe quite comfortably. Unfortunately the water washes all the surfactant out of the lungs/pleurae and this combined with the osmotic stress on the lung cells causes the animal’s lungs to collapse, leading to death after a while.
Thanks for the rapid replies! I can still see the picture of that pathetic mouse in that flask seemingly struggling to breathe. Ah, science.
Oh yeah, and I heard somewhere that they use the stuff for premature babies with underdeveloped lungs.
As someone pointed out in their nitpicking review of The Abyss it has one nasty side effect, you can’t use fluorine (I think the liquid’s name) for extended periods, as it will shred the lining in your lungs. For short exposure, it’s fine.
About that halogenated hydrocarbon substance. I imagine it was quite a bit thicker then water, which is already much harder to push around then air?
How long were test animals (and, you impled, people) able to keep moving their diaphragm before tiring out?
Ick. I bet it would feel like having really really bad asthma - struggling to suck in enough liquid to keep from suffocating.
I have no idea what the viscosity of the stuff is, I’ve never seen it. There isn’t really a problem with inhaling with the stuff since it’s administered under sufficient pressure to overcome any of the fluid flow problems it might cause. The whole point of using it on premmy babies I recall was that forcing their underdeveloped lungs to expand using gas was rupturing them. Using liquid actaully allows lower pressures to be used. All the practical applications I can think of for using the stuff would require it under pressure. I assume that in addition to the normal demand valve used for SCUBA there is probably also partially assisted expiration, but I’m only guessing. Premmies of course require assisted respiration on gas or liquid. As for doing it at normal atmospheric pressures I have no idea. In theory it’s possible for any mammal to breathe water if it’s cold enough, but as you suggested the extra muscular exertion is never quite compensated for the oxygen return. With better gas exchange rates than air it may be possible to breathe the stuff indefinitely. Apparently the sensation is far worse than asthma, even if there is no problem wiht gas exchange.
**Saint Zero **
Whatever the stuff is it’s not Fluorine (a fairly toxic gas) but it is probably fluorinated. There may well be problems with breathing the stuff similar to what happns with echidnas in water, though I doubt it if they’re using it on premature babies. I imagine to have any success they’d have to be on the stuff for weeks or months.
There’s a bunch of useful links in the thread from the last time we did this:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=43136
Here’s an article which provides some good information:
Yabob’s link claims that the scene was real?
The rat part, yes, as stated in the other posters sources as well:
Regarding The Abyss, (cool flick, BTW) they talk about this stuff on the Making Of video on the double-DVD version of the movie. The rat did indeed breathe the liquid, the people did not. I believe they said in the documentary that the stuff had been developed by the Navy SEALs, but they have never actually done any human trials. My WAG is that a brave SEAL or two has tried diving with it, as the armed forces really do enjoy testing things on humans.
Another few notes from the text commentary on The Abyss: the fluid breathing by the rats was indeed real, and they would have liked a more protracted shot to showcase the reality (rather than the constant cutaways), but the rats kept panicking and defecating in the liquid, which doesn’t make for good cinema.
Another problem with fluid breathing is that the fluid strips the protective coating (mucus, really) from your lungs, leaving you very vulnerable to infection afterwards. IV antibiotics are a must. The rats in The Abyss got antibiotic shots, and they were fine.
Couldn’t a mouse hold its breath under water for a minute anyway?
If it were holding its breath, you wouldn’t see its little sides moving in and out…