I got into diving a couple of years ago, and managed to combine the two passions - there's an Open Source diving computer[1], and it's fascinating to read through the source[2].

I was surprised on looking into it more that we're really just winging it algorithmically + safety margins, based on research done in the 60s. The empirical research basically consisted of the Navy et al. throwing people in at depth, and seeing what got them "bent".

Everybody's physiology is different though, and there are a large number of factors over-and-above that which affect whether you'll suffer Decompress Sickness (DCS).

Whilst there have been some iterations on Bühlmann[3] such as VPM-B[4] (which is based on bubble diameter vs. tissue compartment loading), the field is still lacking IMHO.

Not really through any fault of their own, it's just very difficult/expensive to peer into the body whilst they're down there to see what's going on, and it seems we'd need a large sample size due to individual physiology playing a part. Still, the algos seem to work... most of the time. Just don't drink too much alcohol, sleep well, hydrate. And do your stops! :)

Interestingly, saturation divers / Navy generally don't use a computer as the divemaster singularly plans the dives for the group with massive safety margins. As they're already saturated, they're generally not doing stops "outside" in the wet anyway. If they do have a computer, it will even have the tables/algos removed from it.

[1] https://heinrichsweikamp.com/

[2] https://bitbucket.org/heinrichsweikamp/ostc4/wiki/Home

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%BChlmann_decompression_al...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dive_computer#Algorithms

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user:	aksyn
created:	October 8, 2016
karma:	5