Australia's Contribution to the Origins of the Partial Pressure Suit: A History of the Cotton Anti-G Suit

Pressure suits developed for high flying military pilots in the 40s and 50s are recognised as the ancestors of today's space suits. However, few in Australia would be aware of this country's contribution to the origins of the partial pressure suit. The largely forgotten aero-medical work of Professor Frank Cotton, of the Department of Physiology at the University of Sydney during the Second World War, paved the way for the development of the first US partial pressure suits. American research in this field owes a great, if indirect, debt to Prof. Cotton's fundamental physiological research and his practical work on the development of the first pneumatic 'anti-g' suit. Although recognised as a pioneer of sports medicine, Cotton's war time aero-medical work has remained largely unknown, due to his early death in the 1950s. This paper will present the results of preliminary research into archival and artefact material from the University of Sydney relating to Prof. Cotton's work. It will outline the scope and significance of his research in relation to pressure suit development during the Second World War, the results of which was shared with the United States and Canada, and attempt to place it in its context in the history of space suit development.