Space Medicine Associates Blog

So now that the International Space Station is near completion, here come the platitudes about its value as a research platform being fully realized, etc. Indeed, platitudes abound (particularly promulgated by NASA over the years) regarding the value of space research conducted on the space shuttle as well as the ISS. Some have questioned the "real" return on investment of such research (the IOM report which cited the waste of time that protein crystallization experiments have been is one that immediately comes to mind.)

One oft-cited "factoid" about space research concerns the value of biomedical investigation... and how knowledge of the physiological effects of spaceflight can lead to effective "countermeasures" to mitigate such effects. Nevertheless, has any of this research really led to breakthroughs in true countermeasures? What has the NSBRI been doing all these years? As one colleague has put it, the only effective countermeasure to the physiologic effects of spaceflight is.... a Gravity Prescription. Indeed, man has evolved in a 1G environment... and if taken out of that environment, logic would dictate that replacing that G force is the obvious answer to the deleterious physiologic effects which occur in microgravity.

The problem is.... what IS the Gravity Prescription and how to we "make" it? I'd love to hear some of your ideas and speculations (or frank disagreements with my opinions regarding the "real" value of space research.)