Trip to Mars Would Turn Astronauts Into Weaklings


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Astronauts on a mission to Mars could lose nearly half their muscle strength during the long trip, giving them the physiques of senior citizens by the time they arrived, according to a new study.

Prolonged exposure to weightlessness could cause astronauts to lose more than 40 percent of their muscle strength even with regular exercise, researchers said. On a long voyage, a healthy 30- to 50-year-old astronaut could end up with the strength of an 80-year-old.

A 10-month trip to Mars would cause such extreme muscle deterioration that astronauts would find it difficult to perform even routine tasks, let alone move around the Martian surface in spacesuits, according to the study, which was led by Robert Fitts of Marquette University.

Returning to Earth could be even more perilous, the researchers found: The astronauts could be too weak to evacuate their spacecraft if they needed to make an emergency landing.

The research is detailed in the Aug. 17 edition of the Journal of Physiology.

The new Journal of Physiology study recommends that astronauts in zero gravity focus on high-resistance exercise to keep their muscles from wasting away. Ploutz-Snyder says that's just what the space station's ARED machine will deliver.

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Astronauts on a mission to Mars could lose nearly half their muscle strength during the long trip, giving them the physiques of senior citizens by the time they arrived, according to a new study...

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I'm pretty sure this has been a concern for a number of years - the people on the ISS have to take steps to help prevent similar muscle waste, so why wouldn't it be any difficult for those on their way to and from, Mars? Just re-engineer some kinda exercise bike / resistance gym "thingy" and they'll be fine ;)

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What is "artificial gravity"?

what is it? it's gravity that isn't real...

generally this would be produced by a spinning element to some potion of the space craft that acted like a centrifuge

it's implemented in a number of sci-fi films :)

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What is "artificial gravity"?

with current science, it would mean constantly accelerating the entire spaceship at 1G halfway to Mars, then turning it around and constantly decelerating it at 1G again

a less comfortable option would be to make the spaceship in a shape of a ring and everyone lives in a loop, look straight up and you would see the other side, kind of like a mini version of the Halo ring

the way i see it, is that we go to Mars to prove that out science has been good enough to invent spacewarps/teleportations/whatever.... it should not be about putting ourselves through 10 months of this...

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They're not giving them artificial gravity on board? I thought it would be a given that they would...

Funny, the way you say it sounds like it's just adding some button labeled "gravity".

In reality, we have never built anything that is capable of producing artificial gravity in space.

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Funny, the way you say it sounds like it's just adding some button labeled "gravity".

In reality, we have never built anything that is capable of producing artificial gravity in space.

Micro-singularities in the floorboards :shiftyninja:

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Imagine walking into a room and then 100 x gravity is switched on. You would probably be instantly crushed.

Definitely as it would create atmospheric pressure 100 times greater than what we're designed for (1).

They could adapt some exercise equipment for travel or they could develop some sort of resistance suit.

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They're not giving them artificial gravity on board? I thought it would be a given that they would...

Sure right after they give them warp drive and inertial dampeners

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