Slashdot Mirror
Disease May Prevent Manned Journey To Mars
Pickens writes "Science Daily News reports that human missions to Mars and all other long-term space flights might be compromised by disease, first because space travel appears to weaken astronauts' immune systems; and second, because it increases the virulence and growth of microbes. 'When people think of space travel, often the vast distances are what come to mind first,' says Jean-Pol Frippiat from Nancy-University in France, 'but even after we figure out a way to cover these distances in a reasonable amount of time, we still need to figure out how astronauts are going to overcome disease and sickness.' Frippiat says studies show that immune systems of both people and animals in space flight conditions are significantly weaker than their grounded counterparts and that common pathogens such as Salmonella, E. coli and Staphylococcus reproduce more rapidly in space flight conditions, leading to increased risk of contamination, colonization and serious infection."
Diversified ecosystem.
-IOVAR Web Dev Platform
Well, we had people on long term space missions on Mir and ISS that are comparable in time with a mars mission, without them being eaten alive by E. coli, Salmonella and whatnot. What was the problem again?
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
This isn't a first post, but it's the only Ice Pirates reference on Slashdot.
Women are like electronics: you don't know how damaged they are until you try to turn them on.
Why not rotate the ship for "artificial gravity"?
I'm not an immunologist, but the gist of your post echoes my thoughts. Provided the astronauts are properly isolated prior to a manned mission to Mars, I assume the risk of pathogen transmission would be greatly reduced. Sterilization of all food provisions carried for the mission would be assumed. I understand that we may not have good data on extended periods (read: multiple years) of lack of exposure to commonly encountered pathogens; perhaps the personnel involved would require an extended stay in a gradual re-acclimation environment following their return to Earth. To address concerns over illnesses encountered on the journey, I'd hope that highly trained medical personnel and provisions for proper treatment of a wide range of illnesses would be included in any approved mission protocol.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
While getting rid of salmonella is good, you can't get rid of all disease causing bacteria. And if the environment you live in is too sterile, your body just becomes more susceptible to other infections and to auto-immune disease.
Injecting antibiotics is about the worst thing you can do because it really messes up your bacterial ecology. Bacteria are a natural part of your body, and if you start killing them with antibiotics, things go wrong. Antibiotics should really only be taken when there is a serious infection present.
In addition to artificial gravity (via rotation), the solution may be to challenge the body with other microbes that are known to be not too harmful, similar to "pro-biotic drinks".
Why do we care about sending our meatbag selves to other planets? I'd be more productive if we could just send some strong AI to do it for us.
Maybe we're meant to be on Earth after all? The conditions seem just fine, ... for now at least.
But please, send more robots first. They can do a lot more with a lot less controversy.
There have been ISS Expeditions that have lasted times comparable to at least one way to Mars - Expeditions 4, 6, 8 and 13 at least. There is no microbiological difference between orbiting the Earth and going to Mars, so I would conclude that people should be able to get to Mars just fine.
I still think that truly deep space exploration will require artificial gravity (i.e., spinning spacecraft), but this sounds like FUD to justify research funds to me.
Of course, by the time we have the technologies you propose, we're just as likely to have ion propulsion that can get us there in less than a month.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Look into what Bigelow Aerospace is doing. If you spin an inflated structure fast enough to get 1 G of acceleration, it's the same as doing so with a rigid structure.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Boy how would those trips compare to early the first voyages to the "New World", except that they will probably be more clean, more antiseptic, and their health will be monitored much more closely.
What's worse tuill now no one has pointed this out. What pussies we've become.
The conquistadors at the 15th century were able to travel long distances on ships full of diseases, and yet conquered and eliminated the native civilizations of America. Diseases may be a difficulty, but they won't prevent space travel.
I'm just saying, maybe those Nancy frenchmen have weak immune systems, but I don't see a problem for us Americans.
Your immune system responds better if there are constant challenges to it, which is what a diversified ecosystem does.
Lots of sex.
Without condoms (and with swallowing). Regular exchange of bodily fluids also keeps your immune system ticking over. Regular sex might help morale as well.
No but yeah but yeah but yeah no but yeah no but yeah... ...but no
because that may result in this! And that's no diversity what you see although it may be interesting to watch this move around Mars for a while and it cleans things up here a little.
By the way, if USA did not engage in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, it would have the money to build that spaceship *by itself*.
Thats what I was thinking. Surely a small capsule with a handful of people surrounded by thousands of miles of near-vacuum is about as close to a clean-room environment as you can get.
Sterilize everything, let them spend a blissful year or two in splendid good health, then worry about their poor shattered immune systems when they get back.
It is really sad that nuclear rockets were abandoned when the space race was won by the US against the Russians. Nuclear rockets consist of a reactor that heats hydrogen that is accelerated.
A nuclear rocket would take 3 months to get to mars, 3 months back. Back in 1970, 400 M $ were missing to get the first one off the ground as a third stage of an Apollo rocket.
The theoretical useful weight for a nuclear rocket is 38% of the total that can go up in space, compared to 4% for a chemical rocket.
Nerva-2 would have developped 5000 MW and 90 tonnes of lift. Nerva-1 had already been tested on the ground. 1100 MW and 25 ton lift.
As soon as the Chinese threaten to do this, the US might be back in the race. One can always hope.
The plan in the early 1970ies was to send two of these off to Mars (for obvious redundancy purposes).
Bollocks. The US could build rockets if it wanted to. The US used to spend 6% of GDP on the military during the cold war. Britain spend 50% of GDP on the military during the second world war.
The Iraq and Afghanistan wars are small drops in the ocean compared to such ventures.
Also, remove 100 billion $ from the trial lawyers.
And drill, baby, drill!
It could also have done as Harding did in 1920-21 recession. He cut the budget in half between 1920-22. And the national debt by 1/3. The result turned out to be the roaring 20-ies. The recession disappeared so quickly that nobody remembers it now.
http://ezinearticles.com/?Warren-G-Harding-and-the-1920-Depression---Learning-the-Right-Lesson&id=3121606
During the space race, 400 000 people in the US worked on the Apollo project.
sending humans to Mars is pretty much a 99.99% waste of everyone's resources
Most of what we do is a waste of resources. Why do you go for a walk? Why do you eat at a restaurant? Why do you drive your sports car? Why do you need a hobby? Why do you have a pool in your backyard? Why, in fact, do you have a house that is larger than 100 sq. ft. per person?
In a non-wasteful world people would be confined to cocoons, immobilized (to not waste energy on movement) and fed liquid paste that contains exactly as much energy as they really need, laying still in those cocoons. Of course there would be no entertainment - the lid of the coff^W cocoon is closed after you are born, and won't be opened until you die. Diseases like flu would be impossible in those cocoons, and in any case treating you from an illness would be also a waste of resources, better to just recycle your still living body and make another one (makes sense, isn't it?)
Tie a rope around the crew module and the lander. Separate them by a few hundred feet and start them orbiting each other. Instant gravity.
Borrow a superconducting magnet from the LHC and place it at the center of the 2 modules. Shields up.
Now what's the problem?
If I didn't have absolutely NOTHING to do, I wouldn't be here.
Paging Valentine Michael Smith. Valentine Michael Smith please report to thread 0510212.
Help stamp out iliturcy.