The same occurs for water in tissues and organs. The remaining problem is the blood, where most of the nitrogen could be rapidly transferred as the whale descends. Usually when diving with compressed air, the supersaturation of the slower tissue compartments determines the need for decompression stops. Because these compartments do not take up enough nitrogen to become a decompression problem, they do not have an effect on the decompression. The blood however may be an important problem during decompression.
Blood is considered to be a rapid half time tissue.
It takes up nitrogen rapidly from the lung because of the direct interchange of gases which occurs in the lung. The blood nitrogen capacity of the 100 ton sperm whale at 100 meters depth is calculated to be 93 mols, and the total amount of nitrogen in the lung is 142 mols. The blood will take up most of the nitrogen which is in the lungs, if the exchange of gas occurs normally. There is some question of whether nitrogen diffusion into the blood is slowed during diving because of the reduction of lung size from Boyle's law. If this is the case, the blood would be a slower uptake tissue.