title: Experimental and numerical study of physiological responses in hot environments.
abstract: This paper proposed a multi-node human thermal model to predict human thermal responses in hot environments. The model was extended based on the Tanabe's work by considering the effects of high temperature on heat production, blood flow rate, and heat exchange coefficients. Five healthy men dressed in shorts were exposed in thermal neutral (29 °C) and high temperature (45 °C) environments. The rectal temperatures and skin temperatures of seven human body segments were continuously measured during the experiment. Validation of this model was conducted with experimental data. The results showed that the current model could accurately predict the skin and core temperatures in terms of the tendency and absolute values. In the human body segments expect calf and trunk, the temperature differences between the experimental data and the predicted results in high temperature environment were smaller than those in the thermally neutral environment conditions. The extended model was proved to be capable of predicting accurately human physiological responses in hot environments.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Public Safety Research, Department of Engineering Physics, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Public Safety Research, Department of Engineering Physics, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Wenguo
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Weng
authors.affiliation: Institute of Public Safety Research, Department of Engineering Physics, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Baoting
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D018869:Heat-Shock Response; D006358:Hot Temperature; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008954:Models, Biological; D012881:Skin Temperature
keywords: Hot environment; Human subject test; Human thermal model; Physiological response