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Do you feel better after breathing a sigh of relief? It’s comfortable. It turns out there’s a good reason why we feel so good after big breaths, and it’s because of a special fluid inside our lungs. The fluid – pulmonary surfactant – helps our lungs function. Without that, we would be in serious trouble. but Researchers at the Swiss University ETH Zurich He found that deep breathing has an interesting effect on how this fluid interacts with the lungs.
New research, published In the journal Science AdvancesIt could have beneficial effects on future medicine and treatments.
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‘Magic’ lung fluid to the rescue
Scientists have long been interested in how this fluid helps us breathe. In the 1980s, research in this area led to a life-saving treatment for babies born prematurely with underdeveloped lungs.
By extracting fluids from the lungs of animals and injecting them into the lungs of premature babies, doctors were able to reduce the occurrence of respiratory distress syndrome immediately after birth. The fluid reduces surface pressure in the lungs.
“This surface pressure affects how well the lungs fit,” said Jan Vermant, a professor at the ETH Zurich. “The more compliant the lungs are, the less resistance they have to expansion and contraction – and the easier it is to breathe.”
Deep breathing to relieve stress
The research team wanted to see how lung fluid behaves when it is stretched and recompressed, so they mimicked the movements of normal, deep breathing in the laboratory.
They measured the surface pressure of the liquid in each case and compared the data. The researchers found that surface stress decreased significantly after a deep breath.
The outer layer of thin film that fluid leaves on the lung deposits and hardens over time.
“Right at the border with air, there is a surface layer that is a little bit more solid,” said Maria Noves Silva, a doctoral student in Vermant’s research group and first author of the study. The apparent expansion and compression of pulmonary fluid that comes with a deep sigh actually rearranges the composition of the surface layer, she said.
So, after you take a deep breath, breathing becomes easier for you. That’s why we feel comforted by a deep sigh.
A spokesperson for ETH Zurich said clinical practice has also found that breathing becomes increasingly complex with sustained shallow breaths. So, laboratory measurements appear to track real-world observations.
The researchers believe that this study may contribute to a better understanding of lung failure in adults.