{"id":399903,"date":"2025-10-03T13:36:56","date_gmt":"2025-10-03T17:36:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yorku.ca\/yfile\/?p=399903"},"modified":"2025-10-03T15:27:26","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T19:27:26","slug":"york-faculty-scale-new-heights-in-physiological-health-research","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yorku.ca\/yfile\/2025\/10\/03\/york-faculty-scale-new-heights-in-physiological-health-research\/","title":{"rendered":"York faculty scale new heights in physiological health research"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Olivier Birot<\/strong> was approaching the summit of the Olan, a mountain in the French Alps, this summer when his body began failing him. <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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At 3,500 metres, dehydration and altitude stress triggered a physiological cascade that would end in helicopter rescue. For the ¿ì²¥ÊÓƵ professor, who grew up in these very mountains between France, Italy and Switzerland, the harrowing experience became an unexpected case study in extreme environment physiology. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incident occurred during what Birot and his colleague, Professor Emilie Roudier<\/strong>, had planned as a mountain climbing experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Birot arrived at York in 2008 after training at Claude Bernard University in Lyon, with a specialty in extreme environmental physiology and serving as a defense scientist, studying how harsh conditions affect the human body. Roudier joined York in 2015, bringing expertise in microvascular health from her doctorate at Universit\u00e9 Grenoble Alpes and postdoctoral work at the Karolinska Institute. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both from the School of Kinesiology and Health Science in York\u2019s Faculty of Health<\/a>, they understand that real breakthroughs in physiology happen when you take the science beyond controlled laboratory conditions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou simply do not get that experience from reading research papers,\u201d Birot says. Their summer climb would demonstrate that principle more dramatically than either had anticipated. <\/p>\n\n\n