In: Biology
In a paragraph, explain why people who live in Denver have more red blood cells on average than people who live in Dallas. Make sure your explanation includes something about the effect of altitude on partial pressure of oxygen and make sure your explanation includes something about how hormones play a role in this
There are many concepts which needs to addressed before answering this question. Let's first discuss about the role of RBC's in our body. The red blood cells plays a significant role of transporting oxygen in our body. Red blood cells have a special protein called hemoglobin which has the ability to carry oygen and transport oxygen.
Now at high altitudes the partial pressure of oxygen is very less as compared to low altitudes. If the partial pressure of oxygen is less it means that number of oxygen molecules per volume of air is less. Which straightly explains you that at high altitude less amount of oxygen is entering into our body. To compensate for this decreased oxygen, the body wants to maximize the amount to oxygen transporting/delivering in our body, hence the body triggers the production of the hormone called erythropoietin, which increases the production of RBC inside our body ( and thus increasing hemoglobin).
Now as per the question Denver is at high altitude and Dallas is at low altitude and now you can correlate the differences in number of RBC's in people of both the regions.