Qi is a survival necessity that ensures the function and energy production of cells. Without sufficient oxygen, organs and cells in the human body will die. However, scientists have found that restricting the inhalation of oxygen at certain specific times may actually help the body better repair injuries.

In fact, the human body does have mechanisms to cope with environments with different oxygen concentrations. Preliminary research has found that under hypoxic conditions, some special cell differentiation and metabolic mechanisms in the human body can be activated, which can help in the treatment of certain diseases and enhance human health.

However, currently, people's understanding of the underlying mechanisms of hypoxia is still very limited. Deeply studying the benefits and drawbacks of hypoxia on the human body will help improve human health and overcome more diseases.

For climbers Ralph Duimowitz and Nancy Hansen, who have climbed eight of the world's highest peaks together, the thin air environment doesn't seem to be a big problem. In May 2018, the two of them entered the low oxygen module of the German Aerospace Center, which was the "highest peak" they had ever climbed in their career.

After a two-week adaptation period, they persisted for 16 days in an environment even rarer than the air at the summit of Mount Everest, with 4 days having an oxygen concentration equivalent to being in a mountainous area at an altitude of 7112 meters - which is very close to the "dead zone" at an altitude of 8000 meters. In the "dead zone", hypoxia can affect the judgment of mountaineers and increase their risk of heart attack and stroke.

Throughout the entire experiment, the two mountaineers and the researchers who observed them hesitated several times whether to interrupt the experiment. But fortunately, they persevered. If Duimowitz and Hansen can prove that humans can tolerate prolonged periods of hypoxia, it will pave the way for a more ambitious experiment: testing whether people's lack of oxygen for a period of time is beneficial to their bodies.

High altitude adaptation

Or can it make the body healthier?

This sounds a bit strange. Because our organs and tissues require oxygen. At the beginning of the COVID-19 in 2020, the patients' blood oxygen content was low enough to confuse doctors, so they would add a "more oxygen" to their treatment plan. Similarly, patients with heart disease or stroke also need to inhale oxygen after an attack to ensure that their tissues do not die.

However, scientists have found that some hypoxia adaptations seem to be beneficial. About 140 years ago, French physiologist Paul Burt proposed the hypothesis that the number of oxygen carrying red blood cells in the body increases in high-altitude environments. Air Force pilots in the 1930s underwent high-altitude adaptation training before flying open cockpit aircraft.

During this period, doctors noticed that hypoxia seemed to help treat various diseases from asthma to hypertension. There are still many clinical phenomena indicating that when the heart and spinal cord are damaged, appropriate hypoxia may actually help patients recover faster.