The thickness of the alveolar capillary wall in guinea-pigs at high and low altitude

Abstract

The thickness of the alveolar-capillary wall was measured in the lungs of seven guinea-pigs born and living at La Raya, in the Peruvian Andes, at an altitude of 4200 m and in seven sea-level representatives of the same species. This was achieved by carrying out morphometric studies on electron micrographs to obtain the so-called arithmetic and harmonic mean thicknesses. The arithmetic mean thickness was always the larger, this being due to the greater emphasis which the technique employed places on the copious amounts of connective tissue in the interstitial space of the alveolar capillary wall in this species. These thicker portions of the alveolar wall are not concerned with gaseous diffusion. The harmonic mean thickness probably gives a more physiologically realistic estimate of the magnitude of the diffusion barrier to oxygen. This proved to be smaller in the animals from high altitude and may facilitate diffusion of oxygen from alveolar spaces to blood, thus making less steep the “oxygen cascade” from inspired air to mitochondria.