- Scottish physiologist
whose studies of the exchange of gases during respiration led to an
interest in the health hazards of coal mining and deep-sea diving. His
aim was to bridge the gap between theoretical and applied science.
Haldane was born and educated in Edinburgh. He was director of the Mining
Research Laboratory (first in Doncaster, then in Birmingham) 1913-28.
He also lectured at various universities in the UK, the USA, and Ireland.
Haldane devised methods for studying respiration and the blood - the
Haldane gas analyser and an apparatus for determining the blood gas
content. Having investigated the danger to miners of suffocation, he
turned to the toxicity of carbon monoxide, which is usually present
in mines after an explosion, and showed that this gas binds to the haemoglobin
in the blood in preference to oxygen.
In 1905, Haldane published his idea that breathing is controlled by
the effect of the concentration of carbon dioxide in arterial blood
on the respiratory centre of the brain. In 1907, he announced a technique
of decompression by stages which allows a deep-sea diver to rise to
the surface safely; it is still used today.
He also researched the reaction of the kidneys to the water content
of the blood, and the physiology of sweating.
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