Exercise physiology labs

The exercise physiology labs study human exercise performance and fundamental human physiology in sport, exercise and health.

Our exercise physiology labs

Our facilities include:

  • Human Performance Laboratory: for athlete and general physiology testing. Fully supported by state of the art equipment for respiratory and metabolic analyses, ergometry, power output measurements, ECG, EMG, NIRS, Doppler ultrasound.
  • Muscle Strength and Power Laboratory: for comprehensive analysis of muscle function and performance.
  • Environmental Exercise Laboratory: for simultaneously acclimatising up to ten athletes in heat and at high humidity, as well as exercise at simulated altitude in a low oxygen environment.
  • Heat Chamber: for human or materials testing in precisely controlled adverse climatic environments. These facilitate industry collaboration in testing equipment, clothing and product performance.
  • Body Composition Laboratory: for sophisticated determinations of body density and anthropometry. It includes a whole body laser scanner for rapid, high throughput determination of body dimensions.
  • Invasive Exercise Laboratory: for exercise science research utilising tissue sampling (e.g. muscle/fat biopsy and blood sampling), nutritional or pharmaceutical interventions to understand mechanisms of physiology in exercise.
  • Blood Biochemistry Laboratory: for immediate processing and analyses of acidity, electrolytes, glucose, lactic acid, and fluid shifts in blood collected from all exercise physiology laboratories.
  • Exercise Physiology Teaching Laboratory: utilising the latest technologies to teach exercise physiology.

Institute for Health & Sport (IHES)

We are a flagship research institute at Victoria University that address real-world problems in health, sport and active living.