Man in space. The human body in space What is the name of the state in space

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Surely every person, at least once looking into the starry sky, dreamed of flying into space and seeing all this beauty closer. Perhaps the most persistent of us will even manage to make this dream come true.

Well, we are in site interested in what changes can happen to the body if you dare to fly into space. At the end, a nice bonus awaits you.

9. Your body will have to adapt

About half of the people who have flown into space have experienced space sickness. In outer space, Earth's gravity does not act on a person, which means there is no pressure on the body. Because of this astronauts experience nausea, headache, disorientation, discomfort, dizziness, and sometimes vomiting... This syndrome, as a rule, is observed only for a couple of days, then the body adapts.

8. In space, you will smell strange

There is no air in space, and it would seem that it should not smell at all. However, according to the flying people, when they are aboard the spacecraft, its space smells like fried steak. Others compare its scent to metal, gunpowder or ... a burnt trash heap.

Experts say that these odors originate inside the enclosed space of the ship. They can be caused by human sweat and skin, upholstery, appliances, and waste products. Smells can also be brought in from outer space. For example, if an astronaut had to work near the ship's engine and the remains of the exhaust ended up on the spacesuit.

7. You risk losing your nails

Gloves that are too bulky in a spacesuit interfere with normal blood flow in the fingers. Most often it is leads to peeling of nails. But situations are not uncommon when astronauts lose their nails due to the pressure exerted on the nails.

Therefore, it is not surprising that more than once there were cases when astronauts deliberately removed their nails in advance, if the plan was a spacewalk.

6. Stop snoring

In space, reduced gravity also affects our respiratory system - there is no significant pressure on the tongue and palate, so there is no involuntary vibration. Because of this many of the problems associated with sleeping in space simply disappear. For example, if you snored before the flight, you will stop in space.

5. Vision problems will begin

Long periods of time in space are also fraught with the risk of blurring your vision. Zero gravity causes body fluids to flow into the upper body. Because of this intracranial pressure rises and begins to act on the optic nerves. A short-term stay in such a state is not dangerous, but a long-term one causes significant harm to the eyes.

4. Bones will become more fragile and muscles very weak

Hovering is the only way to travel aboard spacecraft and in outer space. People do not need a fulcrum for movement, as a result, the bones of the lower extremities become fragile and there is a risk of muscle atrophy.

Probably, the changes will affect your heart as well - it may decrease, since the load on it while being in microgravity conditions will significantly decrease.

3. You will get a couple of centimeters taller

When you find yourself in space, your height will increase by 3-5 cm. This is due to the fact that due to microgravity, very low pressure acts on the spine. From this it begins to stretch, and you get taller... After returning to Earth, everything will fall into place.

2. Without a spacesuit in outer space, you will probably die

An acceptable annual dose for an employee of a nuclear power plant is considered to be 20 millisieverts - 20 times more than an ordinary person receives.

For comparison, an astronaut who is on the ISS for a year receives 200 millisievert. For 5 years of being in space, a person receives a dose of radiation comparable to that usually received throughout his life. All this can provoke the development of radiation sickness. The risk of damage to the nervous system increases - impaired cognitive and motor functions, negative changes in behavior are likely.

Bonus

But despite all the disadvantages associated with a space odyssey, there is something that pulls into space like a magnet. Some astronauts say that during their space flights they experienced the so-called feeling of enlightenment, euphoria, epiphany.

Astronaut Russell Schweikart described our Earth as follows: “This tiny, stunning Earth. The planet that allows us to live, gives us everything that we have: the food we eat, the water we drink, the air we breathe, the beauty of all this nature. Everything in it is so perfectly balanced and organized so that we can live here. How amazingly beautiful she is. "

Why do you think astronauts in space experience a state of weightlessness? There is a high probability that you will not answer correctly.

When asked why objects and astronauts appear in a state of weightlessness in a spacecraft, many people give the following answer:

1. There is no gravity in space, so they weigh nothing.
2. Space is a vacuum, and there is no gravity in a vacuum.
3. Astronauts are too far from the surface of the Earth for the force of its gravity to act on them.

All of these answers are wrong!

The main thing to understand is that there is gravity in space. This is a fairly common misconception. What keeps the Moon in its orbit around the Earth? Gravity. What keeps the Earth in orbit around the Sun? Gravity. What prevents galaxies from flying in different directions? Gravity.

Gravity exists everywhere in space!

If you built a tower on Earth that is 370 km (230 miles) high, roughly the height of the space station's orbit, then the force of gravity acting on you at the top of the tower would be almost the same as on the surface of the earth. If you dared to take a step from a tower, you would rush to Earth just as Felix Baumgartner is going to do a little later this year when he attempts to jump from the edge of space. (Of course, we do not take into account the low temperatures, which will instantly begin to freeze you, or how the lack of air or aerodynamic drag will kill you, and falling through layers of atmospheric air will make all parts of your body experience firsthand what it is like to “strip three skins And besides, the sudden stop will also cause you a lot of inconvenience).

Yes, so why does the space station or satellites in orbit not fall to Earth, and why do astronauts and their surroundings inside the International Space Station (ISS) or any other spacecraft appear to be floating?

It turns out it's all about speed!

Astronauts, the International Space Station (ISS) itself, and other objects in Earth orbit do not float - in fact, they fall. But they do not fall to Earth due to their enormous orbital speed. Instead, they "fall around" the Earth. Objects in earth orbit must move at a speed of at least 28,160 km / h (17,500 mph). Therefore, as soon as they accelerate relative to the Earth, the Earth's gravity immediately bends and pulls their trajectory downward, and they will never overcome this minimum approach to the Earth. Since astronauts have the same acceleration as the space station, they experience a state of weightlessness.

It happens that we, too, can experience this state - for a short time - on Earth, at the time of the fall. Have you ever been on a roller coaster ride, when immediately after passing the highest point ("top of the roller coaster"), when the cart is already starting to roll down, your body lifts from the seat? If you were in an elevator at the height of a one-hundred-story skyscraper, and the cable was broken, then while the elevator was falling, you would be floating in zero gravity in the elevator car. Of course, in this case, the ending would have been much more dramatic.

And then you've probably heard of the "Vomit Comet" airplane - the KC 135 airplane that NASA uses to create short-term zero-gravity states, to train astronauts, and test experiments or equipment under zero-G conditions. , as well as for commercial flights in zero gravity, when the plane flies along a parabolic trajectory, like in a roller coaster ride (but at high speeds and at high altitudes), passes through the top of the parabola and rushes down, then at the moment the plane crashes, conditions are created weightlessness. Fortunately, the plane exits the dive and straightens out.

However, let's get back to our tower. If instead of the usual step from the tower you made a running jump, your forward energy would carry you far from the tower, at the same time, the force of gravity would carry you down. Instead of landing at the base of the tower, you would land at a distance from it. If you increased your speed while taking off, you would be able to jump further from the tower before reaching the ground. Well, if you could run as fast as the space shuttle and the ISS orbit around the Earth, at 28,160 km / h (17,500 mph), then the arc of your jump would circle the Earth. You would be in orbit and experience a state of weightlessness. But you would fall without reaching the surface of the Earth. True, you would still need a spacesuit and a supply of breathable air. And if you could run at about 40,555 km / h (25,200 mph), you would jump straight out of the Earth and start orbiting the Sun.

When exploring the cosmic abyss, the most important question is how the human body will behave in space? During the flight to distant planets and stars, the environmental conditions will in no way resemble the terrestrial ones in which people evolved. Currently, there are two shields - a spaceship and a spacesuit. The first protection provides for life support systems - this is air, water, food, maintaining the desired temperature, counteracting radiation and small meteorites. The second protection ensures the safety of a person in outer space and on the surface of a planet with a hostile environment.

The space branch of medicine has existed for a long time. It is developing rapidly, and its goal is to study the health of astronauts who have been in outer space for a long time. Doctors are trying to figure out how long humans can survive in extreme conditions and how quickly they can adapt to earthly conditions after returning from flight.

The human body needs a certain amount of oxygen in the air.... Its minimum concentration (partial pressure) is 16 kPa (0.16 bar). If the pressure is lower, then the astronaut can lose consciousness and die from hypoxia. In a vacuum, gas exchange in the lungs proceeds as usual, but it leads to the removal of all gases from the bloodstream, including oxygen. After 9-12 seconds, such blood reaches the brain, and the person loses consciousness. Death occurs after 2 minutes.

Blood and other body fluids boil at a pressure below 6.3 kPa (water vapor pressure at body temperature). This condition is called ebullism. Steam is capable of swelling a body 2 times its normal size. But the tissues of the body have good elasticity and are rather porous, so there will be no breaks. It should also be borne in mind that the blood vessels, due to their internal pressure, will restrain ebullism, so some of the blood will remain in a liquid state.

To reduce ebullism, there are special protective suits. They are effective at pressures up to 2 kPa and prevent bloating at altitudes over 19 km. The suits use 20 kPa of pure oxygen. This is enough to maintain consciousness, but the evaporation of gases contained in the blood can still cause decompression sickness and gas embolism in an untrained person.

Humans cannot exist outside the magnetosphere, and therefore the human body in space is exposed to high levels of radiation. For a year of work in near-earth orbit, the cosmonaut receives a dose of radiation that is 10 times higher than the annual dose on Earth. Radiation damages lymphocytes, which maintain the immune system at the proper level.

In addition, cosmic rays in galactic space can provoke cancers of any organ. They can also damage the astronaut's brain, which can lead to Alzheimer's disease. Therefore, doctors are developing special protective drugs to reduce the risk of negative events to an acceptable level. And yet it should be said that interplanetary missions outside the Earth's magnetosphere are extremely vulnerable. Here you need to take into account powerful solar flares. They are capable of causing radiation sickness in astronauts, which means death.

In mid-2013, NASA experts reported that a manned mission to Mars could involve a high radiation risk. In September 2017, NASA reported that radiation levels on the surface of Mars had doubled. This was attributed to the aurora, which turned out to be 25 times brighter than previously observed. This happened due to an unexpected and powerful solar storm.

Human organs subject to physiological changes in space

Now let's talk about the effects of weightlessness on the human body in space.... Short-term exposure to microgravity causes a spatial adaptation syndrome. It is expressed mainly in nausea, as the vestibular system is upset. With prolonged exposure, health problems arise, and the most significant are the loss of bone and muscle mass, and the work of the cardiovascular system also slows down.

The human body is mainly composed of fluids. Thanks to gravity, it is distributed in the lower body, and there are many systems to balance this situation. In zero gravity, fluid is redistributed to the upper half of the body. For this reason, the cosmonauts have puffiness on their faces. Impaired balance distorts vision, and changes in smell and touch are also recorded.

It is interesting that in space many bacteria feel much better than on Earth. In 2017, it was found that bacteria become more resistant to antibiotics in zero gravity. They adapt to the space environment in ways that are not observed on Earth.

As weightlessness increases the amount of fluid in the upper body, intracranial pressure increases. The pressure on the back of the eyeballs increases, thereby affecting their shape. This effect was discovered in 2012, when astronauts returned to earth after a month in space. Deviations in the work of the visual apparatus can become a serious problem for future missions, including a mission to Mars.

An artificial gravitational system can be a way out here. However, even with a complex gravity system installed on a starship, the state of relative microgravity can remain, and, therefore, the associated risks.

The psychological consequences associated with prolonged stay in space have not yet been clearly analyzed. There are analogues on Earth. These are Arctic research stations and submarines. For such teams, changing the environment is a great stress. And its consequences are anxiety, depression and insomnia.

Sleep quality in space is poor. This is due to the change in dark and light cycles, poor lighting inside the ship. And poor sleep affects neurobiological responses and leads to psychological stress. Dreams can be disrupted due to the needs of the mission and the high noise levels from operating equipment. 50% of astronauts receive sleeping pills and sleep 2 hours less than on Earth.

The study of a long stay in space has shown that the first 3 weeks are the most critical for astronauts. It is during this period that the human body adapts to extreme environmental changes. But the months to come are also difficult. However, the missions are not long enough to judge long-term physiological effects and changes.

A flight to Mars and back, taking into account modern technologies, will take at least 18 months. But now no one can say how the human body will behave in space for a year and a half, and even in the absence of a magnetosphere. Only one thing is clear: the ship must have a huge amount of diagnostic instruments and medical supplies. Only in this case the crew's efficiency will remain at the proper level.

Endless outer space is a hostile environment for humans. There are countless unknown dangers lurking in it. But, in spite of everything, people are determined to conquer space. And therefore, scientific work in this direction is carried out tirelessly. Technologies are being developed that include artificial gravity and bioregenerative life support systems. All this should nullify future risks and enable people to colonize the galactic abyss..

Vladislav Ivanov

Today, perhaps, even a small child knows about the fact that weightlessness is observed in Space. Such a widespread dissemination of this fact was the result of numerous science fiction films about Space. However, in reality, few people know why there is zero gravity in Space, and today we will try to explain this phenomenon.

Erroneous hypotheses

Most people, having heard the question about the origin of weightlessness, will easily answer it, saying that such a state is experienced in the Cosmos for the reason that the force of attraction there does not act on bodies. And this will be a fundamentally wrong answer, since the force of attraction acts in Space, and it is she who holds all cosmic bodies in their places, including the Earth and the Moon, Mars and Venus, which inevitably revolve around our natural luminary - the Sun.

Having heard that the answer is wrong, people will certainly get another trump card out of their sleeve - the absence of an atmosphere, the complete vacuum observed in Space. However, this answer will not be correct either.

Why is weightlessness in Space

The fact is that the weightlessness experienced by cosmonauts on the ISS arises due to a whole set of various factors.

The reason for this is that the ISS orbits the Earth at a tremendous speed exceeding 28 thousand kilometers per hour. This speed affects the fact that the astronauts at the station cease to feel the Earth's gravity, and a feeling of weightlessness is created relative to the spacecraft. All this leads to the fact that astronauts begin to move around the station exactly as we see it in science fiction films.

How weightlessness is simulated on Earth

It is interesting that the state of weightlessness can be artificially recreated within the Earth's atmosphere, which, by the way, is being successfully done by specialists from NASA.

On the balance sheet of NASA there is such an aircraft as the Vomit Comet. This is a very common airplane that is used to train astronauts. It is he who is able to recreate the conditions of being in a state of weightlessness.

The very process of recreating such conditions is as follows:

1. The airplane climbs sharply, moving along a pre-planned parabolic trajectory.
2. Reaching the top point of the conditional parabola, the airplane begins a sharp downward movement.
3. Due to a sharp change in the trajectory of movement, as well as the tendency of the aircraft downward, all people on board begin to be in zero gravity.
4. Reaching a certain point of descent, the airplane aligns its trajectory and repeats the flight procedure, or lands on the surface of the Earth.

People dreaming of space should think about more pressing problems than asking questions about the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations and their lack of desire to visit us or at least hear. After all, we have not only been sending people into orbit for quite a long time, we are also talking about space tourism that is already almost felt on the horizon, we are happily surprised at the plans of the world space agencies to settle on Mars and the news about private companies investing hundreds of millions of dollars in the study of issues. associated with survival on other planets.

“Space is a harsh environment that rarely forgives human errors and technical failures,” the researchers write in their book Biology in Space and Life on Earth: The Effects of Spaceflight on Biological Systems).

But, unfortunately, human errors and technical failures are not the only issues that we all need to think about before embarking on the era of space colonization.

“The main problem in such missions is biomedical. And it consists in how to maintain human health in conditions of a long stay in such harsh conditions, "- comments retired astronaut Leroy Chiao.

Below we will consider examples of the consequences that people flying into space have to face both within the framework of the flights themselves and after their return home.

At first glance, it might seem that weightlessness is one of the most enjoyable things associated with space travel, but do not underestimate microgravity and its effect on human biological systems.

Lack of gravity in space weakens and makes less efficient our cardiovascular system. Instead of distributing blood throughout our bodies as usual and effortlessly, its ineffective work allows blood to concentrate in the head and chest, which significantly increases the risk of developing arterial hypertension (constantly high blood pressure). In more serious cases, when the efficiency of oxygen supply and distribution in the body decreases due to weightlessness, the risk of developing cardiac arrhythmias increases.

Since muscle activity in microgravity is significantly reduced (muscles do not need to fight the earth's gravity), some of the main muscles of the body begin to atrophy when a person is in space for a long time. The loss of muscle mass and its strength is an indispensable bonus of every long-term space mission. That is why the crew members of the International Space Station are required to do physical exercises every day for a couple of hours, aimed at strengthening the calf muscles, quadriceps, as well as the muscles of the neck and back.

Partial blindness

It is not only the human muscular system that is at risk of the consequences of a long stay in space. There were cases when, after a long stay in space, there were alarming signs of visual impairment. And these cases, it must be admitted, were, unfortunately, not isolated.

Two-thirds of astronauts on the International Space Station reported vision problems. The main suspicion, according to experts from the aerospace agency NASA, falls on changes in the distribution of fluid in the cranial cavity, in the eyes and in the spinal cord in response to conditions created by microgravity. The result is the appearance of visual impairment syndrome due to increased intracranial pressure. In our country, this syndrome is most often called intracranial hypertension (ICH). Fortunately, technology does not stand still, and one day we will get the tools that will allow us not only to understand, but also to effectively prevent the consequences of the connection between intracranial pressure and microgravity.

Inevitability of exposure

Some people on Earth are concerned about the radiation from electrical devices like smartphones. I wonder what they would say if they knew what level of radiation a person has to face in space?

"In space, the radiation dose rate can be 100-1000 times higher than on Earth," says Keri Zeitlin of the US Southwestern Research Institute.

"The very same radiation is present in the form of cosmic rays - highly charged particles, from which we on Earth are screened by the magnetic field of our planet and its atmosphere."

The impact of this effect on the human body can go far beyond our understanding of a healthy environment. The average dose of radiation that a person on Earth is exposed to from natural sources during the year is 2.4 mSv (millisievert) with a spread from 1 to 10 mSv. Anything above 100 mSv sooner or later can lead to cancer. Meanwhile, astronauts aboard the International Space Station could be exposed to 200 mSv. If we talk about interplanetary flights, then this level will generally be about 600 mSv. Even a flight to the closest neighboring planet, Mars, can lead to genetic mutations, DNA strand breakdown, and a 30 percent increased risk of cancer.

Fortunately, the ISS crew is protected from most of the radiation thanks to the same magnetic field that keeps us safe on the planet's surface. But if we are talking about a real flight to Mars, then we do not yet have any suitable protection for this. NASA is trying to solve this issue, which is developing methods to optimize shielding means, as well as methods of biological countermeasures against radiation exposure.

Fungal infection

Despite all our efforts to ensure the safety and cleanliness of spacecraft, the problem of the appearance and impact on the human body of pathogenic organisms in space remains unresolved. The growth rate of Aspergillus fumigatus, the most common cause of fungal infections in humans, is completely unaffected by harsh space conditions, according to a study published by the American Society of Microbiology.

If such a banal and widespread thing as fumigatus is capable of entering and existing on the ISS, then, most likely, there may be other and already more lethal pathogenic microorganisms at the station. Given the far from easy accessibility of the nearest hospital, any infection on board the spacecraft can lead to very serious consequences. Therefore, only further improvement of living conditions and the level of hygiene, as well as the development of technologies capable of providing medical diagnostics and assistance in space, will be able to save astronauts from big problems that once began, it would seem, from the smallest and insignificant.

Mental disorders

It is not only the physical health of long-term astronauts in space that is at risk. Being in a small, hermetically sealed space tin can for many months, during which you have to communicate with the same people every day, realize that you cannot even just lie down comfortably on the bed or get up and walk freely - all this and much more can heat your mental state to the limit and ultimately cause serious psychological trauma.

NASA-funded research on long-term space travel shows that the main concerns of American astronauts during their missions aboard the International Space Station are related to the question of how to deal with the crew members. In his personal diary, one astronaut wrote about the stress he experienced in such interpersonal relationships:

“I really want to get out of here. From these cramped closets in which you have to spend a long time with the same people. Even those things that you in your everyday life, most likely, would not pay attention to, after a certain time begin to get bored here so much that they can drive anyone crazy. "

A lot of research has already been carried out on the safety and protection of the psychological health of astronauts during their stay in space, and will be carried out even more, taking into account the increase in the duration of space flights.

Maximum support for human health during long space flights is a very serious problem and a very time-consuming task to solve, but even this does not stop people who want to become space pioneers. There are indeed people in the world who are ready for literally anything. Despite all the risks described in the results of numerous studies, despite all the potential dangers that await humans in space, despite all the risks to the health of our biological systems and psyche, NASA in 2016 received more than 18,000 applications for the right become astronauts. Record number! We can only hope that the research conducted today in the near future will really allow us to carry out safe space travel, in terms of the level of threats not overtaking ordinary earthly ones.