Blood shift has at least two separate meanings:
- In medicine, it is synonymous with left shift.
- In biology, it may refer to a phenomenon seen when mammals submerge in water. It is part of the mammalian diving reflex. Blood vessels in the extremities contract, leaving a higher percentage of the entire blood volume in the torso. An effect important for freedivers is the resulting widening of the lung's capillaries. It reduces the lung's residual volume, thus increasing the depth at which the residual volume is reached (untrained average is at about 30 meters). According to Yasemin Dalkılıç, she can feel plasma enter her sinuses when diving to extreme depths whilst participating in free diving competitions. See also: immersion diuresis
Famous quotes containing the words blood and/or shift:
“Those times I mussed his curly black hair
and touched his ten tar-fingers
and swallowed down his whiskey breath.
Red. Red. Father, you are blood red.
Father,
we are two birds on fire.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“What is the life of man! Is it not to shift from side to side?—from sorrow to sorrow?—to button up one cause of vexation!—and unbutton another!”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)