Modelling and control of ventilation (advances in experimental medicine and biology)Stephen J. G. Semple, Lewis Adams and Brian J. Whipp, Plenum, New York and London, 1995 Volume 393 Modelling of the respiratory system as a formalised mathematical activity has a very extensive pedigree extending back 50 years or more. It is a challenging physiological domain which has clearly benefited from the interaction of physiologists, clinical scientists and practitioners with mathematicians, engineers and computer scientists. Much understanding, in both qualitative and quantitative terms, of this complex system has been achieved, but there are many secrets still to be unravelled. This present volume offers glimpses of some of the leading research endeavours that are currently in progress. This volume is the latest to emerge from what are known as 'Oxford' Conferences on Modelling and Control and Breathing. The first of the series was indeed held in Oxford in 1978, with much of the inspiration for both that initial event and the subsequent series emanating from the drive and foresight of two Oxford physiologists, Dan Cunningham and Ebba Petersen, and the dynamic, unconventional Polish mathematician, Ryszard Herczynski. From that first Oxford meeting to this most recent event held in London in September 1994 a truly interdisciplinary forum has been created, within which it has been possible to set very clearly in context the latest advances which need a collaboration of physiological and mathematical scientists. Results from all the conferences have been published either as books or as edited volumes such as this. Clearly, a limitation of this edited volume is that many of the contributions are short, and in a number of cases provide tantalising snippets of information, where you ideally would want something more substantial. Nevertheless, the editors have done an excellent job in the sense of structuring the material in an accessible manner so that you can see quite clearly the major strands of research development. This volume is divided into the following four major sections: neurophysiology breathing control; pathophysiology of breathing control and breathing awake and asleep; exercise and pulmonary ventilation; and chemical control of breathing. There are 68 short chapters, where each of the four major themes begins with an overview and introduction, followed by various detailed presentations. These introductory chapters are useful in setting a scene for the more specialist work that follows. In this context, it was interesting to note that just as the worth of any modelling activity is dependent on the validity of the assumptions, so here the introductory speakers do spell out clearly what are their own particular biases. My own view (or bias) is that the most rewarding chapters describe work that brings together workers from both physiological and modelling control backgrounds in a true collaborative fashion. All the topics that you would expect to find included are represented in depth, ranging from receptor and transducer mechanisms, information handling, and control structures and processes across a broad range of types. The research embraced spans fundamental studies, including the use of animal experiments, through to human studies corresponding to both normal activities (e.g. breathing patterns during sleep) and extreme activities (e.g. the anaerobic threshold in endurance triathletes). Overall, this volume provides a useful summary of the principal lines of research in the modelling and control of ventilation, a field of endeavour where much has been achieved, though a great deal still remains to be done. This volume should be required reading for any research worker in the field, whether from the physiological and clinical, or from the modelling and control tradition. The 'Oxford' Conferences on Modelling Control of Breathing have travelled far, but clearly still have a very long way to run. EWART CARSON | ||