Early Friday morning, 25 volunteers from Texas flew from Dallas to Denver, jumped on a bus to Breckenridge, and then immediately ran two miles — as fast as they could — around the Summit High School track.

That's not exactly following the advice of local physicians, who generally recommend people coming to altitude from lower elevations take it easy.

But the travelers, mostly students, are part of a $2.5 million Pentagon-funded study of altitude sickness being conducted by the Altitude Research Center at the University of Colorado School of Medicine.

The center, which is focused on studying the effects of altitude on human physiology, received the grant earlier this year as part of the Pentagon's increased emphasis on using biology to create better fighting men and women. Specifically, the government wants to find ways to swiftly overcome acute mountain sickness, which often strikes those serving in Afghanistan.

If all goes well, results from this study will allow scientists to create an easy-to-use test kit to determine who is likely to get altitude sickness.

“If we can predict mountain sickness from a low-altitude blood test, that would change the world,” Robert Roach, director of the research center said. “Not just for the Department of Defense and their concerns, but for the 25 million visitors to Colorado. Imagine if all these people that come here every year and go to high altitude could take a simple blood test in the mail and predict if they're going to get sick or not.”

Mountain sickness can cause dizziness, excessive thirst, fatigue, nausea, sleeplessness and swelling of the brain.

If there was a test, potential visitors could see their doctors ahead of time for prescription medicine or choose a destination at a lower altitude, Roach said.

Recently, Roach's team conducted a 28-person study in an altitude chamber and discovered a blood test “that almost perfectly predicts who gets sick and who doesn't.” The current study includes 140 people from sea level — “a little more diverse than our student population on campus.”

“If we have luck like we did in the first study in predicting their performance, that will be a breakthrough because there's no other way to do it,” Roach said.

Army ready

The research started in late August and runs through mid-November. The current group is the fourth out of six partaking in the study. All participants eat the same food, stay at the same altitude (at about 10,500 feet on Baldy Mountain) and do the same activities. To participate, volunteers must be between 18 and 40 years of age and physically capable of joining the Army and passing basic training.

After Friday morning's run, which was timed and compared to one in Dallas a few days earlier, participants got a few hours' rest before heading up for a three-and-a-half mile practice hike on Baldy. Saturday morning, they went back up for a timed excursion. Roach is measuring oxygen levels and keeping track of those who show symptoms of altitude sickness. At the end, students will give blood samples. Researchers then try to identify genes that predict who does well at altitude, and who doesn't.

“I do think it has a chance to be successful. The risk and cost is worth it if we are fortunate to have a positive result,” Roach said.

Fort Worth resident and volunteer Rob Gray joined the study because he feels it's important to help the troops out; “For me it was more of a military thing.”

He went skiing in Steamboat once, 20 years ago, which was his only excursion to Colorado. He didn't get sick, although he said “I was a young man at that point.” Before Friday morning's run, he was a little nervous but felt he'd do fairly well. After two miles, Gray reported his legs were tired and that he “knows what they're talking about now, about the air.” He became winded faster than usual, and his time was down about 1 minute, 40 seconds from his run a few days earlier in Dallas.

Participant Tim Mueller had similar results: His run time increased to 16:08 from 14:40. He was pretty fatigued during the warm-up, but started to feel better during the timed run.

“Afterwards, I don't feel bad,” he said Friday. “I don't have a headache or anything else. Hopefully that's a good sign I'm not getting altitude sickness.”