 Concordia Research Station, Antarctica Ever fancied spending some time in Antarctica? If so, take a look through the writings of Dr Stijn Thoolen, an ESA-sponsored medical doctor spending 12 months at the Concordia research station. His photos will either inspire you to go do it, or remind you of how desolate and EXTREMELY cold it is! Do take a look at Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of his blog series, talking about his time at the world's southernmost continent. Dr Stijn ThoolenMedical Research Doctor, Concordia Research Station, Antarctica
It is a beautiful summer day. There is even less wind than usual (with constant summer temperatures, almost always a blue sky and few weather changes, we are mainly concerned with wind), so I am not afraid to go outside in my t-shirt today. The sun reflecting off the snow is attacking me from all directions, and I will most probably burn, but I don’t care. It may be my only chance this year (and I imagine that in a few months I will look back on this day just like you must now look back at those days at the beach, or under the green trees, in the warm sun…). It is busy in front of the station. To the left, an empty rack is being carried away, to the right boxes are sorted, behind me a human chain is carrying them away into a container, and in front of me the green “Merlot” hoists the heaviest stuff. The chaos has something of a busy market on the village square (but then just a little different). Everyone is helping to organize those few 1000 kilos of food brought in by the overland traverse. It had arrived here yesterday, finally, after a day or ten on the ice. Huge logistics. You could say that all that food has arrived just in time, after that monstrous New Year’s Eve dinner two days ago (never seen so much food, not enjoyable anymore). But now that I see with my own eyes what is being stored in those containers and in the station, I am confident we won’t starve this winter.  Fuel, food, material, and most importantly: my personal 110 kilos of fun. In the summer period, the traverse travels up and down several times from the coast to Concordia, over the ice cap, to supply the station, and so that we can start our winter with peace of mind.  The traverse seen by the French Pleiades satellite at an altitude of 700 kilometers. It looks pretty fragile to me. Credits: CNES Summer feels like one big party. I have installed myself in the ESA lab by now, as well as within our DC16 crew, who are all still happy to participate in the biomedical research projects (the ESA lab is also a party). Every few days another plane comes in to deliver a new load of guests or equipment, and pick up old ones. Nobody lives here permanently (although some are almost considered part of the furniture after too many summer campaigns). We are all guests, and we are all working towards one common goal: knowledge.  Greetings from DC16 in summer spirits.. Credits: IPEV / PNRA - S. Guesnier.  Finally I am installed in the ESA lab. Now that the HOMAIR project also covers for the Dutch, there is no need to worry anymore. There are currently around 70 people here at Concordia, a beautiful collection of the most diverse backgrounds but with that same goal, and all of us equally idiot to think that Antarctica is interesting enough to leave the comfort of home for. Seismologists, carpenters, glaciologists, climatologists, electricians, mechanics, meteorologists, astronomers, plumbers, physicists, physicians, cooks, ICT specialists, a cleaner, and a station leader. It makes for a lively experience and ensures that there is plenty to discover besides writing blog posts.  Concordia from above. Laboratories and scientific instruments are dotted around the base outside. Credits: CNES We hope you enjoy Part 3 of the blog by Dr Stijn Thoolen, an ESA-sponsored medical doctor who is spending 12 months at the Concordia research station in Antarctica conducting experiments. Do take a look at Part 1 and Part 2 in his series of blogs, talking about his great adventure to the world's southernmost continent. Dr Stijn ThoolenMedical Research Doctor, Concordia Research Station, Antarctica The end of our world is full of surprises… November 13, 2019, East-Antarctic plateau My arm has gotten tired now of wiping the freshly formed ice from my airplane window every two minutes, but I am too excited to stop. I almost can’t believe it. Everywhere I look is ice. We have been flying over this ice sheet at 5000 meters altitude for about three hours now, with just nothing at all on the horizon. Completely nothing. And even the horizon seems to disappear at times, thanks to the surrealistic way in which the ever-present sunlight melts the white clouds and the ice together. An endless, motionless ocean of ice, that almost makes us disappear as well. I am just wondering if the pilots have a better idea of where we are, when suddenly two familiar towers appear in the distance. Concordia! My new home! And if I already had any expectations from all those preparations of the last months (years), they were now considerably exceeded for sure. What a special and bizarre place, on the middle of that ice sheet, out of nothing: that people live here!  1000 kilometers of ice in all directions. That people live here! Credits: ESA/IPEV/PNRA–S. Thoolen Can you really prepare for a journey to the end of the world? I just hope that all those efforts of the past months haven’t been for nothing, but with all these surprises the past few days I am starting to doubt it. Since our arrival in Christchurch, New Zealand three days earlier it all went so terribly fast again. We hadn’t even left the airport yet, badly jetlagged and craving for a nice bed, when the IPEV/PNRA reception committee cheerfully told us that our next flight to Mario Zucchelli station was taking off sooner due to rising katabatic winds (I had to look it up as well). Here is your bag with polar gear, the key of your hotel room which you will never use, briefing in two hours, boarding in four, good luck!
Welcome to Part 2 of the blog by Dr Stijn Thoolen, an ESA-sponsored medical doctor spending 12 months at Concordia research station in Antarctica. He facilitates a number of experiments on the effects of isolation, light deprivation, and extreme temperatures on the human body and mind.
Dr Stijn ThoolenMedical Research Doctor, Concordia Research Station, Antarctica November 8, 2019, somewhere above Asia I started early today, at 05:00 AM. Despite my sleep deprivation from a too long Nintendo farewell, I now jumped out of my friend’s bed without struggles. I give him, still half asleep, a last hug, and while I walk out of the door that radio in my head spontaneously starts playing again:
 Liftoff! With 6 flights I figured to put on my compression socks… Credit: S. Thoolen
Today it the day, finally. There have been few days in the past months where Concordia didn’t cross my mind. Enough thinking, enough talking, weeks of preparation and training, deadline after deadline finished: now it is time to make it happen! From Amsterdam to Paris, Hong Kong, Melbourne, Christchurch, and then off to the Antarctic, via the Italian coastal station Mario Zuccheli to our icy Dome C. It is only six flights and a day or five. What a party, and that fun is only further enhanced by all those happily-surprised faces of airport staff to whom I have to show my travel plans today (“Oh wow! Best of luck!”).
Today I am focused, bouncing from airport to airport full of curiosity, but the past few days were quite different. I have been ready for Concordia since the end of my training period early October, but over the past month more and more moments of realization squeezed through the goals and automatic pilot of my preparations, that I will really be away, for a full year, from about everything I see around me. Not that it bothered me much at first. It was quite funny actually (hah, Dutch gray rainy day, shall I miss you too?). But with my departure getting closer and the goodbyes less and less trivial, I was now getting overwhelmed with a feeling of uncertainty, a bit of fear perhaps, that I have not felt in years. So there I stood, sobbing and sniffling in my girlfriend’s arms at JFK airport in New York (you can imagine how awkward it is when at the same time a control-savoring security guard is screaming at you: “Sir, I need you to step out of the line, right now!”) InnovaSpace is pleased to welcome Dr Stijn Thoolen to tell us more about life at the Concordia Research Station in the Antarctic, an extreme environment where temperatures can fall below −80 °C (−112 °F) in the winter months. As an ESA-sponsored medical research doctor, Stijn will remain at the Franco-Italian research station for 13 months - definitely not an activity for the faint hearted! Dr Stijn ThoolenMedical Research Doctor, Concordia Research Station, Antarctica  Location of Concordia Research Station. Credits: ESA 75 ° 05’59 “S; 123 ° 19’56” E. I will spend 13 months of my life at these coordinates from November onwards. Far away from my girlfriend, my family and friends, from everything that I know and have loved for the past 28 years. A small 1700 km away from the South Pole, situated on a 3270-high ice sheet, with 40% less oxygen than at sea level (the atmosphere is thinner at the poles), a humidity lower than in the Sahara, average temperatures of –30°C in summer and –65°C in winter, four months without any ray of sunshine (is this lunchtime, or should I go to bed already?) and without possibility of evacuation for nine months, the Franco-Italian research station Concordia on Dome C in Antarctica sounds more like a base on another planet. Every year the European Space Agency sends a ‘hivernaut’ (a winter version of an astronaut?) to this abandoned outpost at the bottom of our globe to perform biomedical experiments on the crew, in preparation for missions to the Moon, Mars and who knows what’s next. This year it’s my turn, and those 13 months are starting to get awfully close… I hear you ask: why (…would you do that for God’s sake)? “In our history it was some horde of furry little mammals who hid from the dinosaurs, colonized the treetops and later scampered down to domesticate fire, invent writing, construct observatories and launch space vehicles” – Carl Sagan  ‘White Mars’, ‘planet Concordia’, you name it. Credits: ESA I sometimes ask myself that question as well, but you can imagine that the answer is as obvious as the undertaking itself.
Maybe we should start with a short self-evaluation: Self-evaluation is not something we often do. At least, I was never good at it. When everything goes according to plan, and everyone around you screams how wonderful it is that “little Stijn wants to become a surgeon!”, you aren’t really encouraged to take a critical look at yourself, right? But sometimes a shock (or two) helps to adjust a bit. A lesson in humility perhaps. For me, that first shock came about five years ago. I had said “yes” a little too much, a good friend died, my parents divorced, and with about ten suitcases of mental luggage I left for a research internship in Boston, USA, during my medical studies. In such a new environment, full with material to reflect on, things became a little more relative. I realised that nothing is as obvious as it seems, that some things might actually be bigger than us (the Universe, God, the flying spaghetti monster, you choose), and, even better, how beautiful and special it is that we are able to witness all that (I know this sounds dull, but I dare you to try with your eyes fixed on a bright, starry sky). Rosemary S. A. Shinkai, DDS, MSc, PhD Professor of Dentistry, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
We still do not know much about the changes in dental and orofacial structures, functions, and diseases beyond Earth. Early studies on aerospace dentistry published at the end of the 1960’s and 1970’s addressed some concerns about oral health in astronauts and challenges for dental treatment delivery in space. If astronauts are selected for being the most prepared and healthy humans to withstand the hard conditions in outer space, what about everyday regular people, the very young or old individuals? Or pregnant space voyagers? Microgravity and radiation in long-term spaceflights and a lifelong stay in space stations or settlements would require specific oral health care. Teeth, gums, tongue, bones, and muscles are part of a complex system, which is highly innervated and irrigated by blood vessels to allow chewing, swallowing, speaking, and smiling. Saliva is produced by a number of large and small salivary glands to lubricate the mouth, form the food bolus, and counterbalance acids produced by mouth bacteria after meals. Recent studies have shown that the microgravity and spaceflight environment alters jaw bone physiology, dental development, saliva proteins, and salivary gland morphology in mice flown on a US shuttle and a Russian biosatellite. Another study revealed that adult rats submitted to gravity tests showed remodeling of craniomandibular bones. Simulated microgravity also modified gene expression and physiology of Streptoccocus mutans and Streptoccocus sanguinis, possibly altering the cariogenic potential of these bacteria. However, the specific effect of space radiation also needs to be investigated.  Will oral health care need adapting for long-term Mars settlement? It still is unknown to what extent the same effect would occur in human astronauts. Besides the potential structural and physiological changes in the craniomandibular system, other behavioral factors and epigenetics are involved in space oral health. For example, dental caries result from a frequent exposure to acids produced by mouth bacteria after ingestion of sugar, mainly sticky or soft, paste-like foods. Thus, eating and cleaning habits modify the risk for dental caries. And the protective saliva flow and composition vary with water drinking, chewing stimulation, medication, and stress. All these factors may be altered in space life and would affect individual responses to not only dental caries risk, but also gum inflammation, orofacial pain, bone loss and repair. Understanding the underlying mechanisms to prevent oral health problems and have effective interventions seems to be appropriate for the planning of long-term space travel.
So, space dentistry may be an interesting job in the future! Adam J CrellinGraduate Medical Student, Oxford University; Analog Astronaut, Austrian Space Forum  Analog astronaut Adam Crellin giving his graduation speech While attending the 2019 European Mars Conference in London this week at the Institute of Physics, we had the pleasure of witnessing the graduation ceremony of the next cohort of newly qualified Austrian Space Forum (OeWF) analog astronauts, who will take part in next years' AMADEE20 Mars analog mission in Israel. Analog astronauts are people who have been trained to test equipment and conduct activities under simulated space conditions, and they play an important role in preparing for future Moon and Mars missions. We liked so much the graduation speech given by analog astronaut Adam Crellin that we asked if we could publish it here on the InnovaSpace website to inspire all the young would-be astronauts out there - dream big! "I would like to open by saying not only how much of an honour it is to speak on behalf of my classmates and the Austrian Space Forum today, but also to stand in front of you all as a newly qualified analog astronaut. I am especially proud to be speaking at a European-wide conference in the UK, organised by the recently reformed Mars Society UK.
In classrooms across the UK, and even the world, children are being asked by their primary school teachers, the existential question of ‘what do you want to be when you grow up?’. Some of these children, fascinated by space, will say they want to be an astronaut. Children often continue this hope as they grow older, perhaps keeping it a bit quieter, guarding it a bit more closely. Later, they then discover that there are a huge range of diverse opportunities in space, and that astronauts are one small cog in a large machine. A machine that contains astronauts who plant flags; plant experts who grow astrocrops; astronomers who study the universe and its laws; lawyers who write legislation through careful engineering; engineers who build spacecraft that rock; and, well, for those who like rocks, there is geology as well as countless other professions." Dr Karina OlianiER Doctor, mountaineer & adventurer  My name is Karina Oliani, and I'm a doctor specializing in Emergency Medicine and Rescue in Remote Areas. Outdoor challenges have always been my passion, and because of this, I've participated in countless expeditions at sea, up mountains, in jungles and in the desert, including climbing Everest 2 times - by the South face in 2013 and North face in 2017. I also love diving and have dived in all the oceans with the biggest predators. In parallel, I am a producer of audio-visual content and have already produced work for the Globo programs "Fantástico" and "Esporte Espetacular" in Brazil, and I have worked as a presenter and guide for the reality shows "Celebrities' Challenge" and "Extreme Mission" on the Discovery Channel.
 For more than four years I have been trying to realize my dream of climbing K2, which is considered to be the most difficult and dangerous mountain to climb on Earth. The first year I couldn't do it because of work commitments, the next year through a lack of sponsorship, and then once again it was not possible as I became very ill after being bitten by a tick. But when you have had a desire for such a long time, you don't give up easily!
The expedition to K2 wasn't easy for me, either physically or mentally. As already mentioned, for most of 2018 I was battling the tick-borne Lyme disease, which is transmitted by the bite of a tick infected with the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi, and for which I still have to take medications. As it turned out though, I hardly felt the effects of the disease during the climb, probably because of the decreasing oxygen levels during the ascent - I think perhaps the Borrelia didn't like the lack of oxygen! K2 is a truly beautiful mountain, very impressive, and one that I was always drawn to, maybe because it represents every challenge a climber expects and more. It is situated in the Karakoram mountain range, which is an extension of the Himalayan mountains, and it sits on the borders between Pakistan and China. K2 has been dubbed “The Wild Mountain,” and one in five of the climbers who have attempted to reach its summit have died. Ben HammondMSc Space Physiology & Health; Human Performance Intern, McLaren Applied Technologies  With international space agencies and the real-life Tony Stark (Elon Musk) making huge advances in rocket technology, it is likely that within the next couple of decades humankind will touch down on Mars. However, this is only half the battle. The gravity on Mars is roughly one third as strong as Earth’s. You may be thinking “great, everything will require less effort”, and you’d be right, however, there is a huge caveat to that. As we’ve found from the results of time spent in space (the longest continuous period being 14.4 months), when people are exposed to levels of gravity lower than that on Earth, losses in muscle and bone occur; predominantly, in muscles which we continually use to walk and maintain our posture. You may have heard the expression ‘use it or lose it’ - hugely applicable here. These losses can increase astronauts’ risk of injury when returning to Earth by leaving them very weak and fragile. A return mission to Mars will take around 3 YEARS to complete, mainly because of the wait for the two planets to be close enough in proximity again to allow a relatively short journey home. That’s around 12 months in microgravity and around 26 months in Martian gravity. Now, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that, based on the numbers, the outlook for muscle retention isn’t great. That being said, we‘re still pretty uninformed about the extent to which living on Mars will stimulate our muscles.
Dr Andrew WinnardLecturer in Clinical/Musculoskeletal Biomechanics; Lead for the Aerospace Medicine Systematic Review Group; Chartered Physiotherapist; Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, Northumbria University  This was a question that the European Astronaut Centre space medicine office asked the Aerospace Medicine Systematic Review Group (AMSRG). With space agencies planning missions beyond low Earth orbit, in spacecraft that might not be as easy to exercise inside as the International Space Station, this question is becoming more relevant. While it is clear that countermeasures are needed to maintain muscle during microgravity exposure, there were questions such as ‘should we really be going to the Moon without exercising?’; ‘can we safely have pauses in countermeasures during Earth-Mars transits?’; and ultimately ‘how long can humans go in microgravity, without exercising, before the muscles seriously decondition?’.  Bedrest study image: © ESA There appeared to be some information available in the research base but no clear and transparent synthesis existed on which to make evidence based medical decisions. The AMSRG, led by Prof Nick Caplan, Dr Rochelle Velho and myself, based at Northumbria University’s Aerospace Medicine and Rehabilitation Laboratory, is all about working with spaceflight operations to provide high quality, evidence based medical guidance and, therefore, we took these questions on readily. It was determined that if data from inactive/no intervention control groups within any study done with astronauts or bed rest participants could be extracted, it would provide the evidence based information on which to inform the questions being asked. The team worked for almost two years, screening 754 potential studies, before extracting data from control groups of 75 individual included sources, to calculate 922 individual effect sizes, making this the largest review the AMSRG has conducted to date. All the included studies were from bed rest, ranging from 60-120 days, with mostly high risk of bias (using Cochrane’s risk of bias tool) and typically scoring 4 out of 8 for bed rest quality (using AMSRG’s bed rest quality tool). Across all the studies the team found that moderate deconditioning effects (effect size ≥0.6) occur between 7-15 days, with large deconditioning effects (effect size ≥1.2) occurring by 28 days. Based on this, it seems that a 5 day Earth-Lunar transit period is probably safe to complete without exercise, at least for the skeletal muscle outcomes. However a Mars transit, that is likely to be 200+days, needs to counteract muscle deconditioning if the crew is to arrive and be able to function in a gravity loaded environment. Additional consideration was given to ‘worst case scenarios’, such as if there were a crew member more susceptible to low gravity induced muscle changes, for which the team used the most extreme negative end of the confidence intervals as a model. In these cases, a large deconditioning effect could be reached by 7 days and then even the travel time to the Moon could potentially become problematic. However, this model is rather crude due to large confidence intervals caused by the typical low sample sizes in human spaceflight research, and individual effects are difficult to determine in a way that is easily transferable to astronauts. Over the whole evidence base, there was great variety in outcome measures and time points evaluated across studies, along with limited data for all outcome measure subgroups, with research gaps highlighted in the published review’s results tables. No patient reported outcome measures of minimal clinical worthwhile changes were established that would help provide a more patient-centred approach to space medicine. This has been a common finding in AMSRG reviews. While space agencies require astronaut simulating bed rest studies to be done to set standards, it might be useful to try and establish a list of core outcome measures that would benefit human spaceflight operations, to become a foundation for patient-centred space medicine and to standardise the data presented to the field as a whole.
Dr Joaquim Ignácio S da Mota Neto / Dr Thais RussomanoPsychiatrist, Federal University of Pelotas, Brazil / Founder & Scientific Director, InnovaSpace The brain is the prime and most complex organ of the human body and within it takes place the sophisticated phenomena that define us as human beings, enabling recognition of and interaction with our surroundings. Basic and primitive survival functions pass through the different formations and axes of the Central and Peripheral Nervous System, but far beyond this are the many other functions that differ in complexity and high degree of neural connectivity, such as those performed by the limbic system, containing the hypothalamus, hippocampus and amygdala. These important structures are responsible for integrating and giving context to aspects of emotions, memories and learning, thus building our cognitive capacities. Therefore, it is essential to maintain the functionality of these cerebral regions that permit the acquisition, storage and recall of information, as together with the cerebral cortex, they are fundamental for several aspects of personal, social and professional performance. The perception of potential fragility of these intricate brain structures is inevitable, when faced with extreme and unknown situations, such as one might encounter on a manned trip to Mars. The effects of different space features, such as radiation or microgravity, may pose a threat not only to the ability of an astronaut to perform both simple and complex tasks, but also to control emotions or react in an adequate manner to a new environment in which access to old memories may become essential.  A recently published article by Mike Wall of Space.com presented the issue of space radiation and how it can affect the brain function and psychological behaviour of animals, in research using a new scientific approach. The study conducted by Munjal Acharya & Janet Baulch of the University of California and Peter Klein of Stanford University, exposed mice for the first time to a continuous and chronic low-dosage radiation (1mGy/day). The idea of the research team was to mimic a manned trip to Mars, during which astronauts would be exposed to 6 months of low-dosage, deep-space radiation. This type of protocol differs from those previously used, in which animals were submitted to high-dosage radiation over short time periods. The space environment is very unique and is full of radiation in the form of galactic cosmic rays, particles of high energy and charge, and solar particle events, which differ from the low-LET (X- or g-rays) radiation that is predominant on Earth. Radiation is known to affect humans in several ways, in three distinct phases: acute, latent and chronic effects. Chemical mediators are first released from damaged cells, particularly from bone marrow, lymphoid tissues and the gastrointestinal tract, leading to symptoms, such as nausea, vomiting and malaise. The latent phase is free of symptoms as it represents the time between the initial cell injury and manifestation of cell renewal. Chronic effects include a decrease in cell count, and increase in the risk of developing cancer, and degenerative and infectious diseases. The negative impact of radiation on the Central Nervous System (CNS) has been considered relatively minor, as the CNS is formed of few actively dividing cells, which provides it with a type of natural resistance. Nonetheless, some studies have demonstrated that space radiation could potentially produce undesirable effects on the brain, including a decrease in function and neurodegeneration. The results from the mice study would seem to corroborate the hypothesis that radiation can indeed cause deleterious effects on the CNS, perhaps due to the longer 6-month period of exposure to the low-dose radiation. These findings, published in the Society for Neuroscience's open-access journal, eNeuro, suggest that mice exposed to radiation had alterations in their hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for learning and memory, and the prefrontal lobe of the cortex, dedicated to cognitive functions and social relationships. The neurological pathway has yet to be defined, but it is already of serious concern to the space scientific community, as such alterations could cause impairment in psychological performance, especially during stressful and critical situations, like those that could easily be experienced during an interplanetary trip, which is exactly the occasion when clear and immediate decision-making or problem-solving responses are needed!  Under normal conditions on Earth, the human cognitive and emotional processes can struggle to perform well enough to cope with the demands of everyday life, and therefore, the subjective and objective adversities of adapting to a long-duration trip to another planet could be a huge challenge. Even if we are able to control each one of the many physical or psychological variables that could impact on our relationship with the space environment, aerospace science still needs to deal with poorly understood aspects related to the interaction of executive memory with emotions, with experts having highlighted that what we remember is never the same as what was originally set to be fixed in our memory - the material undergoes change in the storage process as each individual adds personal characteristics to the stored element.
The peculiarities of the human brain and its crossovers between the acts of feeling, thinking, planning and performing have already led humanity to evolve, overcoming innumerous obstacles from the Stone Age to the Modern Era. However, even in a place with no palpable barriers, like the vastness of space, there will be invisible elements, such as radiation, that could be powerful enough to delay or impede human omnipotence and omnipresence in the exploration of the Universe. |
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