Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff Lauren Vogelbaum Here. Breathing is something we do naturally,
Speaker 1: often without thinking, but many of us are doing it
Speaker 1: completely wrong. According to science journalist James Nestor, he spent
Speaker 1: a decade investigating all the ways we breathe and compiled
Speaker 1: the information into the instant bestseller Breath The New Science
Speaker 1: of a Lost Art, which published in May. He calls
Speaker 1: breathing the missing part of health, says it's as vital
Speaker 1: to our well being as how much we exercise, what
Speaker 1: foods we eat, and how much we sleep. Doing it
Speaker 1: wrong can have dire consequences on our health, he says,
Speaker 1: and contributes to sleep disordered breathing problems like snoring, sleep apnea,
Speaker 1: and insomnia, mental and behavioral conditions like anxiety, depression and
Speaker 1: a d h D, and medical issues like high blood pressure,
Speaker 1: increased heart rate, and diabetes. Decades of studies back this up,
Speaker 1: Nestor says, Yet the way we breathe is largely overlooked
Speaker 1: by the general population. The good news we have the
Speaker 1: power to combat many of these conditions, and we can
Speaker 1: start with our breath. Breathing well begins with nasal breathing
Speaker 1: for starters, the lungs don't like cold, dry air. A
Speaker 1: Nasal breathing warms and humidifies your breath before it reaches
Speaker 1: the lungs. When you breathe through your nose, air travels
Speaker 1: past bony structures in the nasal cavity called turbinates, which
Speaker 1: are covered in soft tissue known as mucosa. These turbinates
Speaker 1: are what warm and humidify your breath. Nasal breathing also
Speaker 1: cleans the air you breathe thanks to tiny hair like
Speaker 1: filters in the nasal cavity called cilia that act as filters.
Speaker 1: Cilia capture dust, pollution, allergens, smoke, bacteria, viruses, and disordered
Speaker 1: other debris in the air that you inhale and traps
Speaker 1: them in the mucus. From there, the debris is eventually
Speaker 1: pushed into your throat and swallowed. Nose breathing also forces
Speaker 1: you to use your diaphragm, the muscle that sits below
Speaker 1: the lungs. Diafragmatic breathing, or belly breathing, as opposed to
Speaker 1: chest breathing, increases the efficiency of the lungs by activating
Speaker 1: the lower lobes, which contain a larger percentage of blood
Speaker 1: than the upper lobes. Breathing through your nose also increases
Speaker 1: the amount of oxygen in your blood more than mouth breathing.
Speaker 1: That's because nasal breathing brings the nitric oxide produced in
Speaker 1: the paranasal sinuses into your lungs. Nitric Oxide is a vasodilator,
Speaker 1: meaning that it relaxes and widens the blood vessels, causing
Speaker 1: them to increase circulation. This allows blood, nutrients and oxygen
Speaker 1: to travel more efficiently throughout the body. It also decreases
Speaker 1: plat growth and blood clotting. Nasal breathing can improve athletic
Speaker 1: performance as well. A trainer of elite athletes conducted several
Speaker 1: studies in the nineteen nineties comparing nose breathing exercises to
Speaker 1: mouth breathing exercises. By hooking a group of cyclists up
Speaker 1: to sensors and recording their breathing and heart rates. He
Speaker 1: found that there was no significant difference in heart rate
Speaker 1: between the nose breathing and mouth breathing exercises, but breath
Speaker 1: rates were consistently lower during the nasal breathing exercises. For example,
Speaker 1: one subject at maximum exertion on a stationary bike had
Speaker 1: a nasal breathing rate of fourteen breaths per minute compared
Speaker 1: to a mouth breathing rate of forty eight breaths per minute.
Speaker 1: Perceived exertion was also significantly lower with nasal breathing, based
Speaker 1: on a self reported scale of one to ten, with
Speaker 1: ten being the most stressful. At maximum exertion on the
Speaker 1: stationary bike, participants rated their perceived exertion at ten while
Speaker 1: mouth breathing, but rated their perceived exertion a comfortable for
Speaker 1: while nose breathing. Nasal breathing also activated the athletes parasympathetic
Speaker 1: nervous system, which indicated that they were calmer and more
Speaker 1: relaxed when breathing through their noses compared with their mouths.
Speaker 1: And Nestor said, when you exhale, you're listening your parasympathetic response.
Speaker 1: You're actually hacking into your nervous system and lowering your
Speaker 1: heart rate. On top of practicing nasal breathing on the regular,
Speaker 1: he recommends using this information if you're prone to anxiety
Speaker 1: when experiencing increased heart rate. It might help if you
Speaker 1: exhale for longer than you inhale, say inhaling for account
Speaker 1: of three than exhaling for account of six. Today's episode
Speaker 1: was written by Jennifer Walker Journey and produced by Tyler Klang.
Speaker 1: For more on this and lots of other topics, visit
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com. Brain Stuff is production of
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