The Application of Environmental Control Chambers for Research in Tropical Medicine.

Two environmental control chambers (A and B) designed specifically for the study of the effect of thermal environment on man's physiological responses (A-chamber) and animal's thermal acclimation (B-chamber) have been constructed in the Institute for Tropical Medicine, Nagasaki University in April 1980. The available working space of each chamber is 52.5m3 (4.30×4.80×2.54m). The four principal environment factors affecting the human body which can be studied using these chambers are air temperature (A: -10℃ to +60℃, B: +5℃ to +60℃), humidity (both A and B: 30 to 95%), air movement (both A and B: less than 1 m/sec) and illumination (both A and B: 0 to 1000Lux). Each of these factors can be controlled independently during any investigation of thermoregulatory responses to a thermal environment. In order to test the performance of two chambers, experiments on the physiological responses of rabbits to heat and cold stress were performed. The specifications for the control of these chambers and some modifications were discussed in this paper