AME 30334 HEAT TRANSFER Technical Memo No.

C2 Title: Estimation of Time of Hypothermia Onset Underwater Submitted by: Ryan Slaney (901357081) Date submitted: 22 February 2011 Abstract: The purpose of this computation experiment was to determine the time at which a human diver experiences hypothermia with varying diving suit thickness and water temperature. This was done by creating an idealized model of the human body and diving suits and using this model to solve an overall governing differential equation. It was found that the time of hypothermia onset generally increased with increasing diving suit thickness and increasing water temperature. Computational procedure: The objective stated above was done by creating an idealized model of the human body and diving suits and using this model to solve an overall governing differential equation, seen below.

Equation 1: Governing Equation in which Mc was the typical mass of a human body, Cb was the effective heat capacitance of said body, qb was the metabolic energy produced by the body, Ti was the internal body temperature of the diver (as a function of time), Tw was the water temperature, and Rtot was the total thermal resistance between the diver's body and the water. This equation was solved in MATLAB using the Forward Euler Method, and the plotted and tabulated results can be seen in the next section. Analysis and results: The diver's internal body temperature was plotted as a function of time for varying diving suit thicknesses and varying water temperatures for both a constant metabolic energy and an idealized metabolic energy. The constant metabolic energy was assumed to be 120 W, and the idealized energy was dependent upon the diver's internal body temperature and represented by the

equation: 3 q b=70exp[ T i T min ] 7 Equation 2: Idealized Metabolic Energy Figure 1 (below) shows the internal body temperature of a diver with an assumed constant metabolic energy of 120 W as a function of time for varying diving suit thicknesses (left) and water temperatures (right). Figure 2 (below) shows the internal body temperature of a diver with a varying metabolic energy as given by Equation 2 above as a function of time for varying diving suit thicknesses (left) and water temperatures (right). Table 1 shows the time at which hypothermia would set in for a diver with a constant metabolic energy of 120 W as the diving suit thickness varied (with water temperature held constant at Tw = 0 C) and as water temperature varied (with suit thickness held constant at h = 3 mm). Table 2 shows the time at which hypothermia would set in for a diver with variable metabolic energy as described by Equation 2 as the diving suit thickness varied (with water temperature held constant at Tw = 0 C) and as water temperature varied (with suit thickness held constant at h = 3 mm).

Figure 1: Internal Body Temperature vs Time for Constant Metabolic Energy

Figure 2: Internal Body Temperature vs Time for Variable Metabolic Energy

Varying Suit Thickness (Tw = 0 C) h (mm) 1 3 5 7 thypothermia (s) 2284 3788 6178 10567 Varying Water Temperature (h = 3 mm) Tw (C) 0 5 10 15 thypothermia (s) 3788 5049 7622 115871

Table 1: Time of Hypothermia Onset (constant metabolic energy)

Varying Suit Thickness (Tw = 0 C) h (mm) 1 3 5 7 thypothermia (s) 2068 3251 4941 7702

Varying Water Temperature (h = 3 mm) Tw (C) 0 5 10 15 thypothermia (s) 3251 4158 5838 10362

Table 2: Time of Hypothermia Onset (variable metabolic energy)

Discussion: As is to be expected, regardless of the metabolic energy, the time of hypothermia onset increased (i.e., hypothermia was delayed) as the diving suit's thickness increased, as well as when the temperature of the water increased. Increasing the suit's thickness would serve to increase the insulation offered to the diver, and this was quantitatively manifested by an increase in the suit's conductive thermal resistance, which would increase the total resistance of the body-suit-water system.

Referring to Equation 1, this increase in total resistance would serve to decrease the temperature difference between the diver's body and the water. Since heat transfer is driven by temperature differentials, as the temperature difference between the diver's body and the water was minimized, the rate at which heat loss occurred was also minimized. In keeping with this line of thought, it can be seen from the data in Figures 1 and 2 and Tables 1 and 2, that increasing the water temperature in which the diver was immersed had a greater effect on increasing the time of hypothermia onset than increasing the diving suit's thickness. Using the data obtained with the internal-body-temperature dependent metabolic energy (seen in Figure 2 and Table 2), increasing the diving suit thickness from 1 mm to 7 mm in a water temperature of 0 C increased the time of hypothermia onset from 34.5 minutes to 128.4 minutes. However, using that same data, increasing the water temperature from 0 C to 15 C with a suit thickness of 3 mm increased the time of hypothermia onset from 54.2 minutes to 172.7 minutes a much more dramatic increase. Numerical analysis like this is necessary in the professional world because data is needed to confirm scientific hypotheses which cannot be tested experimentally. For example, the scientifically ideal way to test the time of hypothermia onset would be to experiment with real divers. This is unfeasible for a couple of reasons. The first is that performing these types of tests on live subjects could be seen as unethical, as it puts them in a harmful situation. Second, everyone responds to decreased temperatures differently due to their unique metabolic rates, so a numerical scheme with idealized variables could be just as accurate and less resource (e.g. time and money) consuming as normalizing results for a population subset. Conclusions: A mathematical model was made to determine the time at which a human diver would experience hypothermia. In general, it was found that as the diver's suit thickness increased and as the water temperature increased, the time of hypothermia onset would also increase regardless of whether a constant or internal-temperature-dependent metabolic energy was assumed. However, the data also

showed that increasing the water temperature had a greater effect on increasing the time of hypothermia onset than than increasing the thickness of the diving suit.