Professor trying for record 100 days living underwater
A Florida professor has been living underwater for the past two weeks and won’t come back to the surface until June if all goes as planned.
Joseph Dituri, a biomedical engineering professor at the University of South Florida, is attempting to shatter a world record for the most days a human has lived underwater. The previous record of 73 days was set in 2014 by two Tennessee professors.
Dituri is trying to live for 100 days in a habitat about 25 feet down in an ocean lagoon in Key Largo, Florida.
On the 15th day of his adventure, Dituri shared the most rewarding, the most challenging and the most surprising things about life in the sea.
Dituri’s main purpose while living underwater is not breaking records but studying how the human body responds to long-term exposure to extreme pressure.
Before he started living in the 100-square-foot habitat, called Jules’ Undersea Lodge, Dituri underwent a battery of psychological and medical tests. While he’s living underwater, and afterward, a medical team will continue running tests on the 55-yearold.
Among the goals of the project, which cost $250,000, will be to study the effects of living in an isolated, confined environment, and to explore whether living under pressure can increase life spans and prevent aging diseases.
“No humans ever stayed past 73 days. We’re going to go all the way to 100.”
When Dituri spoke to USA TODAY, he was 15% into his 100 days below water.
The toughest part is missing his three grown daughters, mother and girlfriend, though he can still text and Zoom with them, he said.
Being away from loved ones was something Dituri got used to when he was deployed overseas while serving in the Navy for 28 years.
Physically, Dituri is having difficulty sleeping. He has a sore back because his living quarters are two inches shorter than his height.
Dituri also realized pretty quickly that living underwater means more trips to the bathroom.
Outside of that, Dituri is feeling fine.
Some studies have shown that living in hyperbaric conditions can slow the aging process.
“So, we suspect I am going to come out superhuman,” Dituri joked.