Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

royalsocietypublishing.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 151 posts

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#91

Post by scotty79 »

jstanley wrote: post #87
amstan wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did nobody do this yet? It would totally be a great prototype for stuff in orbit.

All parts would be spinning at the same angular velocity, so unless it's really far away from its centre of rotation (expensive, inconvenient) you'd experience more acceleration near the centre than at the edges. Maybe that doesn't matter.

One of the commenters here has the right idea. Train riding forever on circular slanted track could easily house some living spaces, offices and gyms. You could book a stay there for few weeks and after that feel like you are walking on air once you come back to normal life.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#92

Post by scotty79 »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #86
Galatians4_16 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the Moon, at normal pressure, humans shoud be able to get enough exercise in a jungle gym, or by donning a set of wings, flapping them to fly.

Given that there is some gravity, putting on a weighted suit to increase their mass would also make sense, although it'd be unwieldy if it's not distributed exactly the same. Plus, getting weight into space is expensive... although probably not as expensive as building a wall of death or spin gravity structure.

Why wall of death? It's gonna be just a neat cylindrical room with vaguely paraboloid walls. Even if you stop running suddenly, dropping down from 2-3 meters in 1/6 g shouldn't be anything more than inconvenient.

Weighted suit wouldn't help with the weight of your organs. They are accustomed to hanging inside you at 1g. Running on wall would provide them with that.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#93

Post by Nevermark »

scotty79 wrote: post #91
jstanley wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All parts would be spinning at the same angular velocity, so unless it's really far away from its centre of rotation (expensive, inconvenient) you'd experience more acceleration near the centre than at the edges. Maybe that doesn't matter.

One of the commenters here has the right idea. Train riding forever on circular slanted track could easily house some living spaces, offices and gyms. You could book a stay there for few weeks and after that feel like you are walking on air once you come back to normal life.

Circular dome colony over a very large rotating space, running on concentric rings of superconducting rails. Spokes of slidable inner-outer weights to counter balance its residence’s movements.

Running on reliable constant nuclear power, from a safe distance.

Maximum gravity at the tilted edges. Only natural gravity at the center. Enter & exit from a tunnel that connects under the center.

Aside from the challenges of location & distance from Earth, if we can build small mobile cities on water (mega cruise lines) on the untamed ocean in Earth gravity, surely a small stationary spinning platter city in low gravity is possible.

I think humans are going to find out that one g has many uses besides health. Good for a lot of manufacturing too. Gravity is a stabilizer, vertical organizer, anchor. Just as low gravity will have many advantages. Being able to quickly “adjust” gravity, by moving location, will be significant.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#94

Post by ordu »

scotty79 wrote: post #89
pwr22 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a symmetric exercise, look at the feet. You'd probably want to keep the overall workout balanced by alternating periodically?

It's because walls are a bit too steep. If you made them into paraboloid, a per would naturally climb as high as they need to, to be able to run symmetrically.

But one leg will still be running a shorter distance then the other.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#95

Post by adrianN »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #86
Galatians4_16 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the Moon, at normal pressure, humans shoud be able to get enough exercise in a jungle gym, or by donning a set of wings, flapping them to fly.

Given that there is some gravity, putting on a weighted suit to increase their mass would also make sense, although it'd be unwieldy if it's not distributed exactly the same. Plus, getting weight into space is expensive... although probably not as expensive as building a wall of death or spin gravity structure.

There are rocks on the moon. You don’t need to bring weights from earth.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#96

Post by gadders »

>>Long-lasting exposure to low gravity, such as in lunar settlements planned by the ongoing Artemis Program, elicits muscle hypotrophy, bone demineralization, cardio-respiratory and neuro-control deconditioning, against which optimal countermeasures are still to be designed. Rather than training selected muscle groups only, ‘whole-body’ activities such as locomotion seem better candidates,

I don't get why whole body locomotion would be the best way to combat muscle hypotrophy and bone demineralisation when that is not the best method on earth.

A better approach would be using bands or even moon rocks to lift weights etc.

Just set new lunar records for the deadlift, squat etc.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#97

Post by vintermann »

jillesvangurp wrote: post #73
Nevermark wrote: post #12

I didn't see any mention of having a spinning surface. A tapered cylinder "gravity gym" with adjustable angled walls, and variable speed spinning, could smoothly create much greater "gravity". Spin gravity would also enable body weight exercises, core exercises, stationary or small area cardio like exercise bikes, VR games, yoga, etc. Even sleeping. EDIT: I missed this: > but Moon-based centrifuges allowing locomotio…

Wild idea: build one on earth to simulate 1.1G (or higher; whatever would still be comfortable) and put gyms, hotels, swimming pool, living quarters, etc. in it. Being in it for extended periods of time would build up muscles and bones. That would likely be something that fitness people and professional athletes would be interested in. And it's a good dry run for building and operating these things on Mars and the Mo…

Spinning stuff in air takes more energy than spinning stuff in a vacuum.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#98

Post by gadders »

maxglute wrote: post #76
safety1st wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm always baffled that these studies don't put more emphasis on resistance training, since the main issue is that your body no longer has to resist the forces of gravity on a day-to-day basis. In theory exercises like the major compound lifts should go a long way because they stimulate almost every muscle in the body. You get a lot of sustained muscle growth out of doing big lifts even just 2-3 times of week. Of cou…

NASA has IRED for resistence training on ISS. IIRC regiment was ~1xBW squats/deadlift for 3x10s in space every few days. Upper body was even more "normie" strength requirements. I think the routine included many hours of resistence training in general with very conservative weights to maintain mass and avoid injury at all costs.

>>~1xBW squats/deadlift for 3x10s

For super-fit astronauts, that's pathetic.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#99

Post by gadders »

knodi123 wrote: post #55
safety1st wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm always baffled that these studies don't put more emphasis on resistance training, since the main issue is that your body no longer has to resist the forces of gravity on a day-to-day basis. In theory exercises like the major compound lifts should go a long way because they stimulate almost every muscle in the body. You get a lot of sustained muscle growth out of doing big lifts even just 2-3 times of week. Of cou…

But you also want to have impact shocks, like your foot hitting the ground, to stimulate bones. Resistance training is certainly helpful, and perhaps a rowing machine could be modified to give you that shock to the legs, too.

Resistance training doesn't just grow muscles, it stimulates bone growth as well.

That's why it's recommended for osteoporosis.

Re: Horizontal running inside circular walls of Moon settlements

#100

Post by eru »

gadders wrote: post #96

>>Long-lasting exposure to low gravity, such as in lunar settlements planned by the ongoing Artemis Program, elicits muscle hypotrophy, bone demineralization, cardio-respiratory and neuro-control deconditioning, against which optimal countermeasures are still to be designed. Rather than training selected muscle groups only, ‘whole-body’ activities such as locomotion seem better candidates, I don't get why whole body…

> I don't get why whole body locomotion would be the best way to combat muscle hypotrophy and bone demineralisation when that is not the best method on earth.

Whole body locomotion is approximately the only way we have ever tried on earth to combat muscle hypotrophy. So we don't know whether that's the best method or not: we just haven't tried anything else.

To be more precise, any method we have tried on earth, be that bands or weight lifting etc _also_ included a hefty dose of whole body locomotion inside a strong gravity field.

(You can get great results from hitting the gym for squats and deadlifts three times a week for an hour. But that regime also includes 24/7 exposure to 1g of gravity.)

Post reply on HN