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British scientists led by Nathaniel Szewczyk from Notthingham University believe that microscopic worms, which are biologically similar to humans, may hold important clues as to how we can adapt to long-term living in space environments, such as a colony on Mars.  

His team sent 4,000 microscopic worms, Caenorhabditis elegans, into space aboard the space shuttle Discovery, and were able to successfully remotely monitor 12 generations of them over a period of 6 months, whilst they were housed on the International Space Station.

This type of worm has long been used by scientists to further our understanding of human biology. They were the first multi-cellular organism to have its genetic structure completely mapped, and many of their genes perform the same function as found in humans, such as promoting muscle function.

According to Szewczyk, in a study recently published in the journal ‘Interface’, many of the biological changes that occur during space flight affect astronauts and worms in the same way.

"We have been able to show that worms can grow and reproduce in space for long enough to reach another planet and that we can remotely monitor their health. Worms allow us to detect changes in growth, development, reproduction and behaviour in response to environmental conditions such as toxins or in response to deep space missions," Szewczyk said.

This makes the worms an ideal and cost-effective way to study the possible effects of both long term and long distance human space exploration, which are known to have major challenges associated with them, including exposure to high levels of radiation, rapid loss of bone density and muscle weakness.

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Exciting times ahead for all at the MicroG Centre, here in Porto Alegre, Brazil as the final stages are neared in the development of the first Manpowered Human Centrifuge (HC) not only in Brazil, but quite probably in Latin America.

The work is the produce of our very own Albuquerque brothers – both engineers and currently completing their MSc’s under my supervision. Marcelo Albuquerque is responsible for the building of the centrifuge itself, whilst his brother Eduardo has been creating the control and monitoring system for the performance of the HC, including rpm, angular velocity/acceleration and G-force, as well as physiological variables of volunteers.

The HC will be rotate entirely by manpower in one of three ways: a volunteer in a lying down position on the centrifuge arm will pedal; a volunteer positioned on an external bicycle attached to the drive system of the HC will pedal; two volunteers will pedal simultaneously from the HC and the external bicycle.

The MicroG Centre Manpowered Human Centrifuge is designed to achieve a maximum of 5Gs (z axis) and will eventually be used to train both experienced and student pilots, demonstrating the cardiovascular and neurological signs and symptoms of Gz+ exposure, such as grey-out, black-out and G-LOC.

Completion of the main structure of the centrifuge is expected by the end of March 2012, with the final tweaking of the control system to follow soon after.  Many exciting new possibilities for future studies in space physiology, aviation medicine and aerospace biomechanics research lie in front of us, and close links between the MicroG Centre and The Centre of Human & Aerospace Physiological Sciences (CHAPS) at King’s College, London should see future MSc students from King’s also benefiting from the possibilities of new research projects.

Well done to the Albuquerque brothers and pedal hard to the finishing line!
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