Mammals Can Breathe Through Their Intestines, Unsettling Experiment Finds
Share
Pigs were able to breathe through their gut when rectally injected with an oxygenated chemical as part of a new study. (Photo: Photo by Joern Pollex/Getty Images, Getty Images)
When pressed for oxygen, some fish and sea cucumbers will use their lower intestines to get a little extra out of their environment. Now, a team of Japanese researchers say that mammals are also capable of respirating through their rectal cavity, at least in a lab setting.
The team’s research is published today in the journal Med and describes the capacity for mice, rats, and pigs to survive longer and have more strength in low-oxygen circumstances when given oxygen gas or an oxygen-rich liquid through their rectums, in a process similar to an enema. While fish like loaches and catfish use a similar method to gain additional oxygen in the natural world, this doesn’t appear to be an evolutionary adaptation for mammals. In ot
A new study from Brigham Young University and the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Centre says that using your phone before bed, with or without a blue light filter, doesn’t impact your sleep.
The university studied 167 people aged 18-24. One-third of the group used their phones with a feature like iOS’ ‘Night Sight’ turned on, the second cohort used their phone regularly, and the final group didn’t use a phone at all before going to bed.
Across all three groups, the research didn’t find any differences between the sleep patterns of the test subjects. After the initial test, the groups were segmented based on their sleep time, including people who got closer to seven hours and people who got around six hours.