This document discusses the evolution of volumetric CO2 measurements from manual methods in the 19th century to computer-based techniques today. Early physiologists in the 1900s collected expired air into bags and analyzed the CO2-volume curve to determine respiratory dead space. In the 1950s, fast CO2 analyzers allowed recording of real-time CO2 and flow profiles. Fletcher introduced the single breath test in 1980 using phase terminology to analyze the expiratory CO2 curve. Current analysis methods fit models to phases of the volumetric capnogram curve to estimate clinically useful metrics like dead space.