Effect of lung inflation and hypoxia on pulmonary arterial blood volume.

Isolated cat lungs were perfused with constant blood flow. During control conditions (Pa02, 100 Torr), pulmonary artery pressure increased as the lungs were inflated. Hypoxia (Pa02, 22 Torr) increased arterial pressure. However, as the lungs were inflated arterial pressure fell. Thus, the magnitude of the hypoxic pressor response was reduced by inflation. During control conditions, arterial volume (ether bolus method) increased with increasing transpulmonary pressure. Hypoxia decreased arterial volume, and the increase in arterial volume with inflation was somewhat less than that during control conditions. When the influences of vascular and transpulmonary pressures were examined independently by changing one while holding the other constant, increasing transpulmonary pressure increased arterial volume beyond that which could be accounted for by changes in the differences between arterial and pleural pressure. However, this influence of transpulmonary pressure did not appear to be altered by hypoxia. Thus, while hypoxia decreased arterial volume at all levels of lung inflation, it had relatively little effect on the influence of interdependence between the pulmonary arterial bed and the surrounding lung tissue.