Sport and Exercise Sciences Facilities

Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing Laboratories 

We perform a range of different exercise tests to better understand how the pulmonary, cardiovascular and neuromuscular systems work in isolation and in combination to determine whole-body exercise tolerance.

For example, by having participants perform ramp-incremental exercise with breath-by-breath pulmonary gas exchange we are able to gain insight into the exercise bioenergetics and characterise parameters known to be strongly related to exercise performance in health, and morbidity and mortality in disease (eg lactate threshold, peak oxygen uptake).

During these exercise tests, we integrate measures of lung function and breathing mechanics (eg flow-volume characteristics and ventilatory constraint, dynamic operational lung volumes, and work of breathing), haemodynamics and muscle function (e.g., muscle oxygenation, EMG, and power) to gain further insight into limitations to exercise tolerance, and how best to target therapies to improve this functional capacity.

We also work in the clinical cardiovascular research facility situated within Leeds General Infirmary to understand exercise limitations in those with heart failure with our clinical collaborators.

Key equipment: Ultima CardiO2 pulmonary gas exchange system, Lode Excalibur PFM cycle ergometer, Analox instruments GL5 blood analyser, Finapress hemodynamic monitoring system, Noraxon Telemyo 2400T G2 EMG system, Artinis Portamon Near-infrared spectroscopy device.

Contacts: Dr Carrie Ferguson (c.ferguson@leeds.ac.uk)