Oxygen and carbon isotopic compositions of gases respired by humans

Creators: Epstein, Samuel; Zeiri, Leila

Abstract

Oxygen-isotope fractionation associated with respiration in human individuals at rest is linearly related to the fraction of the O2 utilized in the respiration process. The slope of this relationship is affected by a history of smoking, by vigorous exercise, and by the N2/O2 ratio of the inhaled gas. For patients who suffer anemia-related diseases, the slope of this relationship is directly proportional to their level of hemoglobin. These results introduce a new approach for studying the mechanisms of O2 consumption in human respiration and how they are affected by related diseases.

Additional Information

© 1987 by the National Academy of Sciences. Contributed by Samuel Epstein, November 17, 1987. We acknowledge the cooperation of the volunteers who provided breath samples used in this research. We are grateful to Dr. Dan Cooper, Chief, Division of Respiratory and Critical Care, Department of Pediatrics, Harbor-University of California, Los Angeles Medical Center, who provided some of the samples and whose active interest was important to the completion of this work. We thank Dr. Charles Mittman, former executive Medical Director, and Mr. Kirk McClelland from the Pulmonary Department, both at the City of Hope, Duarte, CA, for providing some of the samples for our analyses. We thank Joseph Ruth and Eleanor Dent for their technical assistance and R.V. Krishnamurthy and M.J. DeNiro for fruitful discussions. We thank Professor John D. Roberts at Caltech for critically reading the manuscript. The research was supported by a National Science Foundation Grant EAR-8504096 and by auxiliary funds from the Weingart Foundation to the California Institute of Technology. This paper is contribution no. 4486, Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125. The publication costs of this article were defrayed in part by page charge payment. This article must therefore be hereby marked "advertisement" in accordance with 18 U.S.C. §1734 solely to indicate this fact.

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