Comparison of the Human Transcriptional Response to Three Hypoxic Environments

Subjects were exposed to three hypoxic environments, a hypobaric altitude chamber (AC), a restricted oxygen breathing device (ROBD), and a restricted oxygen breathing environment (ROBE), and blood was collected during each exposure for total RNA analysis. Microarrays were used to examine the transcriptional response from subjects for each of the three conditions and results were compared. Few differences were noted in gene expresssion when comparing AC, ROBD, and ROBE. Subjects were exposed to three hypoxic environments and had blood collected prior to exposure, immediately after exposure was completed, 15 minutes after exposure was completed, and 2 hours after exposure was completed. RNA was extracted from blood samples, amplified, and hybridized onto HTA 2.0 microarrays. Sampel data was analyzed to determine if genes were differentially expressed and also to determine if there were significantly changed genes over the timepoints tested.