Does NASA’s recent “laziness experiment” an actual analog
for replicating prolonged weightlessness?
By: Ringo Bones
I think it was around the middle of the 1990s when I first
heard of NASA’s aviation medicine specialists stating in a press interview that
the bone loss experienced by astronauts in prolonged weightlessness is physiologically
similar to anyone who’s lying in bed for prolonged periods. Does this make
bedsores now the so-called “final frontier” when it comes to tackling one of
current space travel’s thorniest problems?
NASA and two other space agencies are asking for 24
volunteers to lie in bed for two months as part of a study, which will pay them
about 19,000-US dollars. And the venue of the study will be the European Space
Agency’s astronaut training facilities in Germany because part of the
requirement of the study is that the volunteers must also possess a working knowledge
of the German language. NASA and ESA officials say that “We are looking for
test persons to take part in a bed rest study from September to December 2019
in Cologne, Germany and spend 60 days lying down.”
The point of the study is to “research how the body changes
in weightlessness. Bed rest simulates this condition.” Based on the study
results, scientists will develop techniques to reduce the negative effects of
prolonged weightlessness on astronauts. During the two months, the volunteers
will live in a single room, but will be divided into two groups. One group will
be rotated around in a centrifuge, similar to an artificial gravity chamber,
which will force blood back to their extremities. The second group will not be
moved. And when they say you’ll do everything lying down, they aren’t kidding.
The volunteers must eat, exercise, get dressed and even shower while lying flat
on their beds. Another catch, the participants’ beds are tilted slightly
downward to encourage fluids to pool in their upper body to mimic as close as
possible weightless conditions experienced by astronauts in space.
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