In Shackleton's trails: Central and local thermoadaptive modifications to cold and hypoxia after a man-hauling expedition on the Antarctic Plateau

Abstract

Cold and hypoxia constitute the main environmental stressors encountered on the Antarctic Plateau. Hence, we examined whether central and/or peripheral acclimatisation to the combined stressors of cold and hypoxia would be developed in four men following an 11-day man-hauling expedition on this polar region. Before and after the journey, participants performed a static whole-body immersion in 21 °C water, during which they were breathing a hypoxic gas (partial pressure of inspired O2: ~97 mmHg). To evaluate their local responses to cold, participants also immersed the hand into 8 °C water for 30 min, while they were whole-body immersed and mildly hypothermic [i.e. 0.5 °C fall in rectal temperature (Trec) from individual pre-immersion values]. Trec and skin temperature (Tsk), skin blood flux, and oxygen uptake (reflecting shivering thermogenesis) were monitored throughout. The polar expedition accelerated by ~14 min the drop in Trec [final mean (95% confidence interval) changes in Trec: Before = −0.94 (0.15) °C, After: − 1.17 (0.23) °C]. The shivering onset threshold [Before: 19 (22) min, After: 25 (19) min] and gain [Before: − 4.19 (3.95) mL min−1 kg−1, After: − 1.70 (1.21) mL min−1 kg−1] were suppressed by the expedition. Tsk did not differ between trials. The development of a greater post-expedition hypothermic state did not compromise finger circulation during the hand-cooling phase. Present findings indicate therefore that a hypothermic pattern of cold acclimatisation, as investigated in hypoxia, was developed following a short-term expedition on the South Polar Plateau; an adaptive response that is characterised mainly by suppressed shivering thermogenesis, and partly by blunted cutaneous vasoconstriction.