JJS jschneider@remove socks cebridge.net wrote:

"Ian Stirling" wrote in message ...
Totally different situations.

In one, you've got lungs full of stale air.
There is a reasonable amount of O2 in it, even after you pass out
(IIRC).

Hemeoglobin is very clever, but it's not magic.
It releases the molecule it's bound to (O2 or CO2) when it reaches somewhere
there isn't much of that gas.

Normally this is a good thing, but when the lungs are full of N2, not
only do you get the normal release of CO2, but the lungs now actively
strip oxygen from the blood, something which normally never happens.
snip
Ding! The light bulb is flickering. Thanks Ian, for being patient enough with me and taking the time to educate. I
was aware that hemoglobin exchanges CO2 and O2. I wasn't aware that it did so in the manner you describe releasing
either in a low presence of the gas in question. That is very interesting. I still do not understand why it took

Yup, it's a beautifully simple mechanism.

the victim so long to recover from a lack of oxygen unless there really was some brain damage that he recovered from
over time?? Do you have any links to the CO2/O2 exchange mechanism for further reading?

http://groups.google.co.uk/group/sci...ac2abacf99c7df

I _think_ this should work.
It's a thread on sci.space.tech, about vacuum breathing.

I can only assume that the long time to recover was due to slight brain
damage, due to the lack of oxygen.