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If we travel to a modest altitude where there is less air pressure, then the nitrogen absorbed in our tissues will reduce a little bit accordingly.Īny changes experienced are so small they can take place gently via the lungs without causing any adverse effects. When we are on land, the air pressure that we experience is relatively constant.Īny changes under typical day-to-day circumstances are minimal and slow, so the equilibrium balances itself out as needed. This equilibrium is just part of normal biology, and having the absorbed nitrogen inside our blood and tissues isn’t any problem at all, but things change when we head underwater. Nitrogen is what we call an inert gas, so what we inhale, we exhale.Īll gases we breathe, including nitrogen, will enter the body via the lungs, get dissolved into our blood, and eventually enter into all of our tissues.īecause nitrogen isn’t used by our metabolism, without any changes in the external air pressure, the gas will be at what is called an equilibrium inside our bodies where what is dissolved matches what is around us. The approximate percentage of the three primary gases in the air we inhale compared to that we exhale are: GasĪs you can see, the nitrogen percentage does not change as our bodies do not use it. So the air we breathe out will have less oxygen and more carbon dioxide in it. Our bodies use up oxygen during the process to convert the food we’ve eaten into energy (called metabolism) and produce carbon dioxide as a waste product. There are other gases in minimal percentages like neon, helium, krypton, hydrogen, xenon, and carbon monoxide that total together about 0.003%.Īs you can see, nitrogen is by far the biggest constituent of air, with it being more common than all the other gases put together. Under normal conditions, dry air contains the following main gases: Nitrogen
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You’ll probably be familiar with some of the major ones but perhaps don’t know all of the constituent gases that make the air we breathe. The air around us, the same as we use when scuba diving, comprises many gases mixed together. Why Does Nitrogen Build up When Scuba Diving?
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Have you heard the term “the bends,” or its more correct name “decompression sickness” before?
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