ESA To Study Human Hibernation 379
colonist writes "The European Space Agency (ESA) plans to study human hibernation for long-duration space voyages (a la 'Alien', '2001'). Although 'practical hibernation mechanisms are at least a decade away', ESA researchers will make initial inquiries into DADLE (D-Ala,D-Leu-enkephalin), an opium-like drug that triggers hibernation in ground squirrels and human cells. Other subjects of interest include dobutamine, a drug that maintains muscle, and the Madagascan fat-tailed dwarf lemur, the only primate known to hibernate."
Alternative Idea (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:5, Informative)
This is still hibernation.
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:5, Interesting)
-B
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Alternative Idea (Score:4, Informative)
Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes my gf reads Slashdot. No, I am not getting any tonight.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Funny)
This has been known to have side effects such as headaches.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:2)
I think you meant to say feign sleep.
How was it we evolved again?
Clearly, it was thanks to uninteresting women. This must explain my problems trying to find interesting women.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:4, Insightful)
Women, with limited reproductive capability, have an instinct to protect themselves from unfit fathers.
Men sleep after sex to counteract the ability to reproduce with another female almost immediately after copulation, hence keeping the couple intact longer.
Of course society has come in and screwed us all up. Women now get pissed at us for sleeping, despite being a chemical reaction. Alcohol and Hollywood screw up what people consider healthy.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Interesting)
You're implying that it's a biological imperative that men go to sleep. In general, all mammals are more or less polygamous -including humans. I would assert that the animal/biological instinct would rather be to have sex with as many women as possible in order to preserve the species.
If you want to argue a psychological imperative, however, you may be
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
My girlfriend's not buying it, she said something about worrying about my own preservation.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
Women want ONE man to fulfill her EVERY need.
Men want EVERY woman to fulfill his ONE need.
That is pretty much all there is to it.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Interesting)
Both would of course require nature to be deterministic so they're utterly wrong. As always, nuances are very important when speaking of evolution so to reiterate for the doubters:
The correct explanation is that men who were sedate -and possibly in this way also more likely to stick around- were better capable of passing on their genes (and ensuring the passees stay alive and reproduce) which in turn in their children
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
Hmm, that's odd...
The NASA website just registered a fifty-thousand percent spike in astronaut applications.
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Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Funny)
Controller 1: What happened?
Controller 2: Jupiter Two has exploded!
Controller 1: My God! What happened? Was there any telemetry?
Controller 2: Just a snippet of transmission.
Controller 1: Was it a distress call? What did you hear?
Controller 2: I heard Commander Janice shout "You bitch!" and then Lt. Sally say something about clawing out eye. Then there was just ten second of hissing and spitting and howling.
Controller 1: Oh no! They synchronized! The dreaded (looks around and whispers) full moon effect!
Controller 2: I thought we solved that with those pills?
Controller 1: Yes, but... (sighs) There were always unknows, and the Jupiter system... sixty-three moons!
Controller 2: We were bloody fools!
Controller 1: That's not funny, Bob.
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:2, Funny)
Get off slashdot you insensitive clod !
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Women on long-term space flights? (Score:3, Funny)
This is why I dont date girls that can read
We must look to Teenagers... (Score:5, Funny)
If it weren't for my daughter... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hell ya, I'd go hibernate, and very likely get paid for it. Can you say, "Test subject"?
Re:If it weren't for my daughter... (Score:2)
Hell, can you say "compounded interest"?! It's the ultimate get-rich-quick scheme, at least for the hibernator.
Re:If it weren't for my daughter... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:If it weren't for my daughter... (Score:4, Funny)
Boring (Score:3, Funny)
Good job ESA (Score:4, Interesting)
The only downside to this is that the space traveler may seem like the trip only lasted a short time period, when it in fact took 10 years. By the time he gets back home his family will have aged 20 years. It actually may be the closest we get to time travel as well (want to see the future? just hybernate for 100 years).
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:2)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Funny)
Fry, is that you?
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think hibernation prevents aging...
Re:Good job ESA (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:2)
BTM
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually e=mc^2 says we've got more than enough energy to spare. The problem is that fission only converts a small portion of the mater into energy. OTOH, antimatter could possibly give us enough energy to reach light speeds. That is, light speeds relative to Earth. From your own position on a space craft, you'd easily exceed light speed relative to the Earth. O
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Interesting)
For example, quantum tunneling allows a particle to travel faster than light for a mere instant of a second by stealing energy from nearby particles. In the end, however, it has to pay back the energy it used. This means that its net velocity never exceeded light speed.
On the more macro level, there is a theory that wormholes [wikipedia.org] could be used to circumvent light speed. Unfortunately, no one knows how to generate enough energy, or where to find the "exotic matter" to create them.
Another (possibly even more credible) theory on FTL travel, is the Alcubierre Drive [wikipedia.org], often confused with the Star Trek notion of a "Warp Drive". Again, the core problem is that we have no idea where the energy for such a craft would come from.
If none of this suits your fancy, then just load up on a few kilotons of Antimatter, and blast off toward the edge of the Universe at 1G of acceleration. Thanks to the dilation of space-time, you should be able to reach the edge of the known Universe in barely a few years time! Of course, there's this slight issue with Earth no longer existing by the time you got back...
Good luck, intrepid space traveller!
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Interesting)
Odd as it may seem, "something near it" isn't that big of a problem. What we need is lots and lots of antimatter, and working engines that use it. Now here's the difficulty: where do we get the antimatter from? We believe we can make as much as we need, if we just had enough power. Unfortunately, with a efficiency conversion of 0.01% (i.e. for every megajoule you put in, you get 100 joules worth of anitmatter.),
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Interesting)
Trip length: 4.0 light years.
Acceleration: 1.0 g.
Time on earth: 5.614136130857504 years.
Time on ship: 3.460041443177856 years.
BTW, you all might be interesting in knowing how long a million light-year space-flight might
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Informative)
While talking about the drug DADLE
Re:Good job ESA (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good job ESA (Score:3, Interesting)
An alternative solution. (Score:5, Funny)
An alternative solution is to design a virtual environment simulator that will make ground squirrels and Madagascan fat-tailed dwarf lemurs believe they are jumping across tree branches, when in fact they are piloting an interstellar spaceships.
Re:An alternative solution. (Score:3, Funny)
The Last Starfighter meets Alvin and the Chipmunks! Scriptwriting may be in your future, my friend.
Re:An alternative solution. (Score:5, Funny)
I, for one, welcome our new Madagascan fat-tailed dwarf lemur interstellar spaceship pilot masters.
Ugh, I feel so dirty.
Oooh, and we can call it... (Score:5, Funny)
...wait for it...
Lemur's Game
Does cancer hibernate too? (Score:5, Interesting)
Likewise aging...
Does cancer hibernate too? - Easier Surgury? (Score:5, Interesting)
Would hibernation be part of a safer anesthetic protocol for surgury? Put the patient into hibernation with local pain killers rather than forcing them into unconsciousness?
This could be a very useful spin-off of this technology and maybe be more important to humanity than facilitating very long duration space-flight.
myke
Re:Does cancer hibernate too? - Easier Surgury? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Does cancer hibernate too? - Easier Surgury? (Score:4, Interesting)
None - the current drugs used to "put somebody under" for surgury and lowering blood pressure/heart rate/respiration are dangerous and require constant monitoring of the patient. If the same function could be provide by a "hibernation drug", I presume that this would be easier on the patient and safer through the course of the surgury.
myke
Re:Does cancer hibernate too? - Easier Surgury? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Does cancer hibernate too? - Easier Surgury? (Score:3, Funny)
NURSE! Hand me that damn scalpel, AGAIN!
Damn damn damn damn! How the hell am I supposed to operate when I need to remake the god-damn incision every five freaking minutes!
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Re:Does cancer hibernate too? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:People will get lazy. (Score:2)
I don't think science can bring back the ones that have turned into skeletons. Maybe you could try a seance?
Re:Does cancer hibernate too? (Score:2)
Great idea! (Score:4, Funny)
Where can I buy some of this stuff?
Your Skills would suffer though... (Score:3, Insightful)
Sean D.
Re:Your Skills would suffer though... (Score:2)
Oh yeah, that's comforting... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Oh yeah, that's comforting... (Score:2)
Rock Hound, Armageddon.
I probably got the quote wrong, but the point is that you already have to be a little loony to get shot into space. X-Prize not withstanding.
Uh... (Score:2)
I hope there going for basic science... (Score:5, Interesting)
Atrophy (Score:5, Interesting)
If they solve that, then they'll have an extremely valuable spinoff technology that will help everyone from the temporarily wheelchair-bound to the hospitalized.
Re:Atrophy (Score:2)
How about an alternative to frozen corpses? (Score:2)
Re:How about an alternative to frozen corpses? (Score:3, Funny)
Before that, they have to find a cure for freezer burn.
Re:How about an alternative to frozen corpses? (Score:3, Funny)
Tired of that "not so fresh" frostbite feeling you get when travelling to Mars on business? Sick of paying thousands of dollars to reattach digits?
Cheer up! The new "Zip-Loc Human Storage system prevents 99.999% of cellular damage from the harsh cold of cryogenic stasis! The Yellow and Blue makes Green seal ensures you'll survive!"
Now available in family size!
OK, but will the ESA study how to build (Score:5, Funny)
Also, if the eventual mechanism is based on bear hibernation, how are the astronauts going to wake up and poo in the woods periodically?
Open source coders (Score:2, Funny)
I want it! (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I want it! (Score:2)
Madagascan fat-tailed dwarf lemur (Score:5, Funny)
Obscure Reference (Score:4, Funny)
The lid above rises and a light comes on. You are in a sponge-lined coffin. The only exit is out.
The panel has 10 buttons: black, brown, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, grey and white.
Re:Obscure Reference (Score:2)
"Suspended" by Infocom, right?
Re:Obscure Reference -Answer: SNOWBALL? (Score:2, Informative)
I thought maybe:
SNOWBALL
Released by Level 9.
They used to do seriously large text based adventures for home computers like the Spectrum and the.. Oric, among others.
Longhorn (Score:3, Funny)
A Humble Suggestions for ESA (Score:4, Funny)
And this drug work's successfully on ground squirrels.
Why not just send the squirrels into space, and skip humanity altogether?
I offer myself... (Score:5, Funny)
Of course, the last time I heard something like that, it was from a bartender who suggested a drink and told me "it was as close to legal opium as you could get".
So, one interesting night later, I have this advice: Stay away from Chartreuse [chartreuse.fr].
Pigs in Space (Score:2)
'Try the new NASA diet. Just sleep the pounds (and your life) away'.
Just.. (Score:5, Funny)
...send them to my cubicle. The second I enter it, all mental and physical functions shut down for hours.
Poor, poor lemurs (Score:4, Funny)
A trait it is about to regret <sound of skull-saw starting up>
TWW
Taking the Meds (Score:3, Funny)
OK, so I can see how I could take DADLE and dobutamine, but how the hell am I going to inject a dose of Madagascan fat-tailed dwarf lemur?
Perhaps I could ask Richard Gere.
Re:Taking the Meds (Score:3, Funny)
This being slashdot, there can be only one answer: Nanotech! That's right, through the upcoming advent of the universal molecular assembler we will create injectable nano-lemurs.
As silly as the idea is, I prefer that to using a giant needle.
sweet! (Score:2)
(ps - I once got a fortune cookie message which read: "bears are not the only creatures to benefit from hibernation". it is now my destiny to hibernate in space. NASA? hire me, please...)
How is this different? We already know the ... (Score:3, Funny)
It's the same as spending all your time on slashdot.
And the biggest effect is that it gets you out of the Finnish army.
Seasonal Affective Disorder (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Seasonal Affective Disorder (Score:3, Interesting)
Reasons the Article doesn't go into.... (Score:5, Interesting)
2. By extension, a 2001-like approach becomes workable - Put part of the crew into hybernation, rotate them in and out as needed. In 2001, this was supposed to be because the planetside geologists and such had little to do until Discovery was close to Jupiter, and then the security/paranoia factor kicked in. In the real case, a ship might rotate crew to even out radiation exposure, or put a crewman who was loosing bone mass faster than others into hybernation to protect his health.
Solution (Score:4, Funny)
Too bad for Britain (and Americans?) (Score:3, Interesting)
By the time this is working, all the children (potential astronauts) will be immunized against opiates, and unable to hibernate.
Opium? Greeeat... (Score:3, Funny)
worthing saga (Score:4, Interesting)
Setting huge plans in motion while sleeping away, they end up with an entire section of the populace that tries to "live" as long as they possibly can. It is really an interesting take on how things like this could kind of get out of hand.
Re:Hibernation ? (Score:2)
Jeroen
Re:Hibernation ? (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, most of what I've read of aging research in the last few years says that's not true, except to the extent that DNA is stripped off the end of the chain every time it's duplicated (as part of an anti-cancer mechanism to kill cells that begin to duplicate endlessly). 'Old age' seems to be more of a triggered event than an accumulation of genetic damage.
Which makes sense when you consider