This is why people like Scott Kelly should be considered heroes. They are pushing our knowledge about manned spaceflight, and doing to at considerable personal risk and effort. But as a result, we are getting more knowledgeable about the problems, and hopefully solution approaches. That stays on the ISS of 6 months or even a year are somewhat a routine is quite an achievement. And we might find out, how to do even longer stays in zero gravity. With these results we then can set mission limits for a potential Mars mission. Of course one obvious solution would be to fly faster. Musk hinted at his BFR presentations of a 3 month flight time which would be less than the routine stays on the ISS.
On the devastating effects of a year in space
51–60 of 135 posts
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
The ISS is simply too small for that. It would have to spin at a ridiculous rate in order to get to a level of gravity where the effects are no longer felt. And in this particular case that is actually a blessing because even if the space station would be able to do this the spaceship used for any interplanetary traveling would not and so no useful data for such a trip would be collected.
Since the centrifugal force for mass m, angular velocity w and radius r is mw²r, you only need w = sqrt(g/r) to reproduce Earth-like levels of acceleration. At r = 10 m, that's already less than 1 rad/s or 1/6 cycle/s. That doesn't seem ridiculously fast. And why wouldn't an interplanetary spaceship be able to spin fast enough? You could just build it as a space station with thrusters.
Sounds like you've just described the "Graviton", a popular amusement park ride.
While a 30 second ride may be fun, I couldn't imagine living on it for months at a time. (granted, it simulates > 1G)
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
So it sounds like even NASA astronauts even have a crappy healthcare plan like the rest of us.
Many countries have universal healthcare, but the US has universally bad healthcare.
I know you're making a joke, but what you're saying is not at all true. Most people in the US have quite good healthcare. That's why it's so hard to change anything.
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#54I’m a little confused why only 48 hours after his return from space, he’s sleeping at home with his girlfriend and debating whether to take aspirin or go to the emergency room. I would have expected significant medical attention for much longer than 48 hours, given that this was the primary purpose for his extended stay on the ISS.
I would have thought even if they're not treating symptoms they'd want to know things like blood pressure and blood chemistry change over time. Like, "We're going to keep drawing blood every hour until things look to be long-term stable."
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Resistance training is certainly still possible, but you still lose the normal ambient resistance you get on earth just from walking around and holding your limbs in place against gravity. The difference between low-gravity and someone on Earth who doesn’t exercise much is probably much larger than the difference between a non-exercising Earthling and an Earthling who exercises. Besides, that doesn’t really work for…
Great point about the treadmill. I guess my point is that I just can’t imagine that all the brilliant people involved with the ISS _didn’t_ think of a rotating structure.. but even just getting a sizable non-rotating structure cost 150B. I wonder what kind of health issues we’d see even with a rotating structure tho. Would living on such a structure really help prevent most of these issues?
Other comments in this thread have discussed it. Sounds like NASA is well aware of rotating structures, but large ones are way too expensive and small ones cause other issues due to the fast rotation required.
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many countries have universal healthcare, but the US has universally bad healthcare.
I know you're making a joke, but what you're saying is not at all true. Most people in the US have quite good healthcare. That's why it's so hard to change anything.
Say what? I cannot find a single friend or family member who wouldn't be complaining at the healthcare; and those who are healthy just complain how high deductibles are in case they got sick.
Have you ever been to Europe? Some west-block countries like Germany? Same wait time for private sector only at the 10% cost surgeries, xrays you name it, with the same equipment that USA is using in most cases.
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#57Based on the experience of cosmonauts who spent long periods of time on various Mir missions in the 1980s and 1990s, what is the long-term impact of staying in zero-gravity space for so long? If they lost bone mass, the walls of their hearts became thinner, and they received the equivalent of 10 chest X-rays daily over hundreds of days in space, are they experiencing debilitating effects 20 or 30 years later?
The current record holder doesn't seem to be doing too bad. Although he doesn't seem to be very public in the last few years, but he's still around at 75, I'd like to live to this age.
> completed his second flight into space in 1994–1995, spending 437 days in space
> Polyakov did not suffer from any prolonged performance impairments after returning to Earth
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#58...And this is why Mars for colonists is still very much a turgid fantasy. We need to dream less, and commit more to the hard and expensive org of solving these problems. Step 1: stop stripping NASA down to bare metal. Here’s some possible insight into the impact of radiation on their brains: http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/05/space-radiation-may-d... this is in addition to bones, muscles, eyes, etc. Edit: the pr…
Yeah - so instead let us not do anything and spend our time commenting on random threads how bad the idea is. You realize that at every cusp of a major technological breakthrough, there were 100s of people like you saying how terrible the idea was? You are getting downvoted for your pessimistic and can't do attitude than anything else.
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Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know you're making a joke, but what you're saying is not at all true. Most people in the US have quite good healthcare. That's why it's so hard to change anything.
Say what? I cannot find a single friend or family member who wouldn't be complaining at the healthcare; and those who are healthy just complain how high deductibles are in case they got sick. Have you ever been to Europe? Some west-block countries like Germany? Same wait time for private sector only at the 10% cost surgeries, xrays you name it, with the same equipment that USA is using in most cases.
I've had relatives that have had quadruple bypass surgery here (Canada) and had to fill out more paperwork when applying for a library card than when checking out of the hospital.
I've also had American relatives that could not, no matter how hard they tried, no matter how many times they called, begged and peaded with their insurance company, to get the treatment they desperately needed. It's like those companies would prefer to drag out the process until you're dead than pay out a nickel.
Re: On the devastating effects of a year in space
#60Astronauts always seem to be these clean-cut godfearing family-men types.
Maybe antisocial misanthropic weirdos would be better suited.
From a psychological perspective. They wouldnt miss family/friends, and might enjoy living on spacefood.