• Question: Do you think it would be possible to invent a way of breathing under water without air, for example special gills?

    Asked by elmo97 to Andrew, Marianne on 24 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: anon

      anon answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      I guess you mean for humans to invent this for themselves. To some extent we have done this with diving equipment. I guess you mean actually moving water in and out through our lungs so that we can stay underwater indefinitely?

      Of course nothing is impossible but in my opinion I think this won’t happen. The biology is too different.

    • Photo: Andrew Maynard

      Andrew Maynard answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      Good morning elmo97!

      You would always need to get oxygen from somewhere, and it would have to be as a gas, unless we could somehow change our lungs for gills (not very likely!). That means we would need some way of extracting enough oxygen from the water, rather than carrying oxygen tanks around with us. This might be possible – essentially making artificial gills. But we might find that the equipment to do it is actually heavier and larger than oxygen tanks!

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