Living in space can have a lasting effect on how the brain works, researchers have found.
Astronauts must learn how to live without gravity in space, whether they’re aboard the International Space Station (ISS) or on a trip to the moon, such as on NASA’s Artemis 2 mission. Space adventurers experience a microgravity environment beyond Earth, but the effect of gravity is so small that it can be considered a virtually weightless environment. But while floating may sound fun, even simple tasks like holding objects can pose unique challenges. So scientists wondered how the brain adapts to this kind of lifestyle.
In a new study, researchers from the Catholic University of Leuven and the Basque Science Foundation Ikerbasque investigated how astronauts’ brains adapt to weightlessness. The research team studied changes in the way astronauts grip objects as they travel from Earth to space and back again.
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The results were a little stranger than you might have expected, and could have serious implications for the safety of future astronauts.
“What we observed was completely unexpected,” said lead author Philippe Lefebvre, professor of biomedical engineering at the Catholic University of Louvain. space dot com.
Researchers have found that months after returning to Earth from space, astronauts struggle to exert the right amount of force to properly grip objects. In fact, their brains were so used to grasping weightless objects in space that it took them months to readjust back to Earth.
Similarly, the researchers found that the astronauts’ brains still expected gravity to exist, so they actually exerted more force than necessary to grasp objects while in space.
Essentially, Lefebvre says, astronauts “misinterpret sensory feedback” both during their space missions and after they return to Earth.
grip and gravity
To conduct the study and examine how the human brain adapts to large changes in gravity, researchers analyzed the grip strength and movements of a total of 11 European Space Agency astronauts both on Earth and in space. In both scenarios, the astronauts performed repetitive movements while grasping an object, which was then studied by the team (back on Earth).
Living on a gravitational planet, we know that if we let go of an object, it will fall due to both inertia and the object’s weight (a combination of mass and gravity). In space, only inertia moves objects. For example, simply releasing an object won’t cause it to “fall,” but tapping on the object will have the same visual effect because you’re manually applying force. But even though you may know it intellectually, it turns out that it takes time for your brain to catch up to gravity (or a non-gravity environment).
These findings show how astronauts apply the wrong amount of force to grip objects when they’re in space and back on Earth, and suggest that our brains take time to gradually adapt to the sudden lack of gravity and its return, at least in terms of grip strength. This could have significant implications for future astronauts traveling to the ISS, the Moon, and someday beyond.
Being able to grip an object correctly can be the difference between being able to perform a routine procedure without a hitch or having a piece of your experiment slip onto something fragile inside the spacecraft. The correct grip can be the deciding factor in whether an astronaut can successfully manipulate a robotic arm or successfully perform a medical procedure.
Understanding how the brain and grip strength are affected by changes in gravity can also have implications for safety, especially during events such as spacewalks and moonwalks. Even exercising inside the ISS can be dangerous if the grip slips.
“Even if the risk of slippage is low, the consequences of slippage can be very dramatic,” Lefebvre explained. “If you move at high speed, [with] If you grab a large object on the ISS, it will continue to move. You could collide with something, which can have a dramatic impact in terms of safety. ”
Whether you’re in space or on Earth, it’s important to stay on top of things.
A study of these results was published today (April 20) in the Journal of Neuroscience.
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