OPERATIONS AT HIGH TEMPERATURES. STUDIES OF MEN IN SIMULATED JUNGLE (HUMID) HEAT

Abstract : The purpose of these experiments was to study the behavior and performance of military personnel when exposed to the high temperature and high humidity of a simulated jungle climate. Tests were carried out under controlled conditions in the Laboratory Hot Room, in a manner similar to that employed in the previous desert studies. For most men, work in humid heat of the degree imposed in these experiments is at first difficult or impossible. By a process of acclimatization man adapts himself to work in the heat. He then works without subjective complaints and with little or no disturbance of bodily functions. Acclimatization appears to be a complex physiologic readjustment which cannot be adequately defined or completely determined by a few simple physiologic measurements. Nevertheless, this adaptation is accompanied by certain physiologic changes which serve as general indices of the whole process. In this report some of these physiologic changes are discussed and represented by a series of charts.