|
The InnovaSpace team in the last years have been involved on a couple of occasions with the innovative activities of Guerilla Science, as they seek to connect the general public with science in new and interesting ways. The benefits of yoga on Earth are well known, and it is certainly an activity that would improve the health of anyone practicing it regularly. The Guerilla crew have come up with a series of great videos linking dynamic yoga stretches with the effects of microgravity on the human body and mind, assisted by five expert space scientists, one of which is InnovaSpace's very own Space Life Sciences Expert Dr. Lucas Rehnberg, who explains about Space Walks and the problems astronauts face when conducting maintenance tasks on the outside of the International Space Station. Get out your yoga mats, exercise your body, and stretch your mind learning fascinating facts about the human body in space! Dr. Lucas RehnbergInnovaSpace Space Life Sciences Expert. Recently I had the pleasure to attend the world’s largest aerospace medicine conference in Las Vegas, the 90th Annual Aerospace Medical Association (AsMA) Conference. This was my second AsMA (@Aero_Med) meeting and it didn’t disappoint.
As a doctor training in the UK with an interest in space medicine, the AsMA conference is a great opportunity to present work, meet other space medicine enthusiasts as well as individuals from different disciplines – but all with a shared passion for space and aerospace. The thought behind this blog was to serve as a taster of what AsMA has to offer to those thinking about pursuing a career in this field or who want to gain an idea of how to become involved. So, this was my experience of the conference: Day 1 - Monday Started with an incredible opening session commemorating the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 and the moon landing. The panel was moderated by Dr Mike Barratt, astronaut and flight surgeon, and consisted of some giants from the Apollo missions: - Dr Charles Berry & Dr Bill Carpentier, Apollo flight surgeons. - Gerry Griffin, Apollo flight director. The session opened with a specially commissioned video dedicated to the Apollo 11 landing in 1969 and the lead-up time. It was an excellent reminder of what was achieved when a nation came together and set the tone for the discussion, reflecting on their experience of Apollo 11 and the Apollo missions. Some of my favourite moments of this session include when Dr Berry told a great story of stopping President Nixon from having a meal with the Apollo 11 crew the night before their launch, including a letter he wrote to President Nixon apologising for this. Then flight surgeon Dr Carpentier told us what flight surgeons learnt from the Mercury and Gemini missions, before starting on the Apollo missions. Dr Carpentier also spoke about some of his training, including practicing jumping from a moving helicopter in order that he could give medical assistance to the landing Apollo crews. Gerry Griffin spoke of the pressure of the Apollo missions and the relief mixed with excitement when the Apollo 11 crew set foot on the aircraft carrier after their landing. He also spoke about the Apollo 1 tragedy, what we learnt from all the Apollo missions, and how this will help human spaceflight now that we are focusing on going back to the Moon. Closing comments from each of the panel followed a similar theme, summed up best by Gerry Griffin, "We’ve gotta get back to the Moon. It’s been 50 years since we’ve done it...we need to get our mojo back."  opening session commemorating the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 and Moon landing
Em janeiro deste ano, a InnovaSpace teve a oportunidade de cativar a atenção de um grupo de estudantes, de 12-14 anos de idade, com apresentações sobre carreiras de cientistas espaciais.
Estudantes da Escola Rainha Dona Amélia, em Lisboa, reuniram-se no auditório junto com a Profa. Berta Ferreira, para aprender mais sobre o papel das mulheres na Era Espacial.
Com os olhos bem atentos, os jovens alunos sentaram-se para assistir à apresentação do Projeto Valentina, a qual começou com uma entusiasmada palestra da Dra. Michele Rosa, que falou sobre seu caminho profissional e científico até se tornar uma pesquisadora da área espacial, juntamente com o trabalho que ela hoje desempenha na posição de Coordenadora da InnovaSpace Portuguese Hub.
 We are very pleased to announce that The Guardian, a prestigious British newspaper established in 1821, published an article this month (22nd Jan 2019) about InnovaSpace Founder and Director Thais Russomano and her pursuit of a career related to space and space travel. Thais is also Senior Lecturer and Deputy Course Director of the MSc in Space Physiology and Health, CHAPS, at King's College London.
The InnovaSpace outreach projects, such as Kids2Mars and Project Valentina, were also highlighted for their efforts to spark the interest of the young towards the STEM areas, and to follow careers linked to future space travel and colonies. Do have a read and tell us what you think! The Guardian Article Dr. Kushal MadanCardiac Rehabilitation Consultant, Dept. of Cardiology, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital New Delhi India  Here on Earth our arterial blood pressure values are set by the pumping action of our heart and by the resistance of our arteries to blood flow, known as peripheral resistance.
Haemodynamics, or the flow of blood in our circulatory system can be summarised as:
Roberto FanganielloInnovaSpace Scientific & Strategic Consultant.  Medical University of Graz On November 21st and 22nd, 2018 I had the pleasure of visiting the laboratory of Prof. Nandu Goswami, at the Medical University of Graz, in Austria. Nandu is an Associate Professor at the university, interim head of the Division of Physiology and Head of the Gravitational Physiology and Medicine research unit. The main areas of study of his research group are cardiovascular physiology, cerebral auto-regulation and space/gravitational physiology, especially using Earth-based models of space flight.  Thank you Nandu - I really enjoyed the visit! Cardiovascular alterations encountered during space missions, such as a reduction in central venous pressure, cardiac atrophy and decreased vascular responsiveness to standing are major concerns for astronauts during and after spaceflight. On Earth, the ageing process is also linked to physiological deconditioning of the cardiovascular system, which creates a parallel with the changes in human physiology secondary to weightlessness exposure. At the Gravitational Physiology and Medicine research unit, bed rest studies are used as a ground-based simulation of microgravity to further understand the effects of deconditioning, both for the elderly on Earth and astronauts in space. This is also an area of special interest for InnovaSpace Advisor Joan Vernikos, who conducted similar research at NASA for many years and has published scientific articles and books on the topic.
InnovaSpace congratulates Nandu for his work, which is a very interesting area of research and can be seen as a good example of technological and knowledge transfer from space to Earth. Together with the InnovaSpace team, I hope we can one day collaborate with Prof. Goswami and his group in Graz. Roberto FanganielloInnovaSpace Scientific & Strategic Consultant.  In this month of November I have joined the University of Eastern Piedmont (Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale Amedeo Avogadro - UPO) to lecture BSc students on basic and applied research in regenerative medicine and tissue regeneration, MSc candidates on innovations in medical biotechnologies, and PhD candidates on bone and cartilage tissue bioengineering. These courses are very much in line with my own three-pronged professional interests: basic and applied research, educational projects/programs, and technology transfer from academia to the market.
With different degrees of depth, the main purpose of these courses is to provide students with a concrete understanding of complex biological systems, studied at the molecular, cellular and physiological levels (and especially related to humans), to equip them with practical knowledge of state-of-the-art biotechnological protocols used in the medical field, and to guide them on developing communications and networking skills in order to cooperate in multidisciplinary, multifaceted teams. The ultimate goal is to prepare them so they will be able to quickly fit into the working environment, at national, European and extra-European levels after graduation.
A few members of the InnovaSpace team had the pleasure of meeting up in September this year in the beautiful city of Lisbon. Although primarily for work purposes linked to the launch of the Space Network (Rede Espaço) at the University of Lisbon, we must NEVER forget to mix a little pleasure wherever the opportunity presents itself - and as you will see from the photos, we had fun in Lisbon too!  Picturesque Lisbon, the capital city of Portugal, is one of the oldest cities in Europe, full of history, culture, and great food. The traditional dish bacalhau (codfish) is famous and has to be tried, while for lovers of something a little sweeter, the pastéis de Belém (a type of egg custard tart) are legendary and were originally made by monks of the Jerónimos Monastery using a secret recipe. As many of these mouth-watering tarts were eaten in our time in Lisbon, it seemed only fitting that we should also visit their place of invention! The former monastery dates back to 1495 and is well worth a visit, especially on a sunny day, and it was from there that Dr. Joan Vernikos, former NASA Director of Life Sciences recorded the few words below, encouraging young people to consider following a career in space research - there couldn't have been a more beautiful setting! Anthropology Of outer Space - On human/non-human relationships in the context of space science19/10/2018
One of the first ethnographies I read when beginning my Social Anthropology Master’s degree course was Beamtimes and Life Times: The World of High Energy Physicists (1988), by Sharon Traweek. She based this seminal account on her five years of fieldwork within the almost exclusively male domain of particle physicists, studying their culture, cosmology and worldview. One fascinating aspect that she underlines is the peculiar relationship that exists between these scientists and the accelerators and detectors they use to identify subatomic particles and understand their behaviour. The accelerators are some of the largest machines built and a great part of the scientist’s life is spent inside them: hence, not just a machine, but a place. Inside these accelerators are placed the detectors, each designed and crafted by a group of scientists to find answers to their specific research questions: not just a machine, but a conceptual and intellectual fingerprint. A new particle found may unveil a big mystery about the universe and catapult a scientist to academic stardom, however, it could also prove the whole hypothesis to have been built on a misguided assumption and thus, failure. As cosmologies and careers are at stake and the data collected may promote a paradigm shift, the detectors hold the hope of access to a hidden world. Therefore, they are more like portals than machines.  Image: NASA - Extravehicular Activity There is a same high dependency on machines in space science in order to access far away or invisible events and data, and this steered my attention toward human/non-human relationships in this context. This dichotomy itself is rather a cultural construct, and in some cultures this line is not clearly defined and is variable according to the cultural context, being more or less defined in certain places at certain times. In the context of space science, it becomes even more blurred. When applied to an astronaut, for instance, this concept tends not to make sense. In fact, an astronaut only becomes an astronaut in conjunction with the spacesuit/spacecraft, or they would be unable even to reach space to become a space-traveller. In this sense, you do not have simply the human (astronaut) and the non-human (spacesuit, spacecraft), but one single entity. An astronaut is inexorably a cyborg: a hybrid of organism and machine.
Thais RussomanoInnovaSpace Founder, CEO & Scientific Director Set your imagination flowing and just consider the following scenario: "What's your preference? Cultural holidays? Something more adventurous?" asked the travel agent. The clients would think for a moment and then, slightly hesitantly, they would respond. "We like extreme sports, like mountain climbing, parachute jumping, or diving into the depths of the oceans." "Excellent - and so I suggest Mars! On the Red Planet there is an extinct volcano, Mount Olympus, the highest in the Solar System, three times taller than our own Everest!" recommended the agent. "And there the gravity is just one-third that of Earth, which reduces your body to just over 30% of what you weigh here. Therefore, it's even easier to climb mountains there." I added, as the Space Medic of the Intergalactic Travel Agency. This conversation and many others like it could be heard during a summer festival in London's Brockwell Park in late July, thanks to the creative thinking of Guerrilla Science, who wanted to present the idea of the possibility of experiencing holiday trips to different planets. Children and adults entered into the game, discussing possible destinations, the activities that could be offered on each planet, or on the moon or an asteroid, the distances to be travelled, and the costs of such a vacation to places far beyond the limits of the Earth. Actors played the role of the travel agents, while I introduced aspects of space tourism that can affect the health of intergalactic adventurers, such as exposure to radiation, the absence of gravity, and confinement within a spacecraft. Projects, such as this, still belong in the realms of science fiction for now, but they will begin to take shape in the not-so-distant future with the political, scientific and technological advances of Space Tourism. And in response to those of you who do not believe such a thing, Albert Einstein would say - "Something is only impossible until someone doubts it and ends up proving otherwise.” |
Welcometo the InnovaSpace Knowledge Station Categories
All
|
RSS Feed