[1][2][3] The laboratory was shut down in 1947 after the Second World War, as university policies halted the research facility from seeking government funds and the President of Harvard no longer saw its worth.
Mayo was discouraged by his current academic path, and wrote to Donham that there wasn't a “competent investigation of the physiological changes induced in the human organism by the conditions of .
[1] Donham's interest in the human side of business operations led him to encourage Mayo to initiate the laboratory for study of the sociological and psychological impacts in the work place.
[5] The interdisciplinary backgrounds of all the founding members meant that the laboratory focused on more than just ‘fatigue’ as a physiological phenomena – they also studied the psychological and sociological effects by which workers are subject to in the industry.
[5] In the beginnings of the twentieth century, industrial workload and fatigue drew the attention of Western science to maximise the productivity of workers for economic prosperity.
[1] It is due to this research that centred heavily around the cultural and political contexts of the period that the facility is used as evidence to suggest the impact sociocultural environments has on dictating scientific progression.
[5] Of the 300 peer-reviewed research studies originating from the laboratory, topics ranged from the general; work capacity and fatigue, to the more specific; cardiovascular and haemodynamic responses to exercise.
They carried out experiments on Olympian marathon runner Clarence De Mar from 1927 to 1932 and discovered that an individual could achieve a physiological steady state, whereby the blood was at chemical equilibrium even during strenuous exercise.
It was later theorised by a scientist outside the laboratory, Walter Bradford Cannon, that the tendency of the human body was to move towards a steady-state – homeostasis – and fatigue research grew in its complexity.
Funding bodies of the Harvard Fatigue Laboratory, like the Committee for Industrial Physiology, provided financial support for a diverse research of human biology.
The lab placed an emphasis on proper calibration of instruments, protocol and standardisation of systemic management duties to set a foundation to all scientific work.
One study showed that the standard leather military boot was not sufficient for cold weather service as they were not impermeable to wet grounds and also did not permit an extra layer of socks for heat control.
An investigation into the use of bats as vectors of incendiary devices was studied by a researcher at the Harvard Fatigue Laboratory; as intel discovered that Japanese civilians would use straw in the roofs of their houses.
[5] Due to the structure of the Harvard fatigue laboratory, PhD students weren't able to complete research there, so this was described as an impediment to the progression of exercise physiology as a discipline.
[12] When the laboratory was closed in 1947, the researchers who gained experience under Henderson and Dill were employed in other institutions more equipped to propel exercise physiology as a discipline.