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Medicine Space

Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons 73

Posted by Soulskill from the i-saw-that-episode-of-star-trek dept.
sciencehabit writes: NASA hopes to send the first round-trip, manned spaceflight to Mars by the 2030s. If the mission succeeds, astronauts could spend several years potentially being bombarded with cosmic rays—high-energy particles launched across space by supernovae and other galactic explosions. Now, a study in mice suggests these particles could alter the shape of neurons, impairing astronauts' memories and other cognitive abilities. In the prefrontal cortex, a brain region associated with executive function, a range of high-level cognitive tasks such as reasoning, short-term memory, and problem-solving, neurons had 30% to 40% fewer branches, called dendrites, which receive electrical input from other cells.
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Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons More

Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons

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  • Some of us are safe (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jodka ( 520060 ) on Friday May 01, 2015 @05:07PM (#49597111)

    Problem: Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons.

    Solution: Tin foil hats.

    • Tin foil is beneath government budget levels. We must now gold plate the interior of our space ships.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Problem: Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons.

      Solution: Tin foil hats.

      It's all part of the government conspiracy to get us to wear tin foil hats. That's why for years I have been wearing my... oh wait.

    • I thought the space capsules were essentially wearing those already?

      Revised news headline: Astronauts leave earth the best, fittest and brightest of us; come back as space jocks.

      • They have some but not total radiation shielding. Such shielding is very heavy and thus very expensive to put into orbit.

        • errr...

          Hang on a sec.

          So you are saying that they have less shielding than a tin foil hat??

          If not, then you have missed my point entirely...

    • Hypothesis: Super Powers would be awesome.

      Conclusion: Hell yeah!

    • [I]Problem: Space Radiation May Alter Astronauts' Neurons.

      Solution: Tin foil hats.[/I]

      True for the short term, but given enough time subjected to a new environment over generations we will evolve defenses. Lead is a solution too, it doesn't have to be gold and it can be applied as an additive in paint on an interior layer of a craft that is out of contact of humans.

  • reasoning, short-term memory, and problem-solving

    This is why it is FAR more realistic that engineering problems need to be explained in "stupid captain talk" instead of lengthy dissertations in techno-babble.

  • Ren was right? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Chas ( 5144 ) on Friday May 01, 2015 @05:31PM (#49597283) Homepage Journal

    Okay! Say it with my (like an asthmatic chihuahua).

    SPACE!!! MADNESS!!!

  • in a small asteroid, live in that. Asteroid dirt should be good shielding material.

    Too farfetched? I think so too, but people were talking about capturing an asteroid and bringing into lunar (or earth) orbit and mining it...

    • You are thinking too small... I think that is what the moon is for. Hollowed out, with equatorial particle accelerators for propulsion - it is a perfect intergalactic space ship.

    • The big problem really is that asteroid dirt or any other shielding adds a huge amount of mass, making propulsion that much harder. Trying to move an asteroid to mars with an ion drive isn't going to get there before the astronauts die of old age, and if you're going to bring huge amounts of extra rocket fuel from earth you might as well just build a huge ship with a lot of water around the central crew area for shielding.

      • Granted, radiation shielding isn't particularly effective for vehicles, but it makes perfect sense for habitats. The ISS for example is basically just sitting there, we could instead maneuver a suitably large asteroid into position via the low-energy interplanetary transport network and start hollowing it out. It has a large up front cost in time and/or energy, and we'd probably want to put it in a higher orbit since its increased bulk would add air resistance(and it's unlikely to burn up on reentry if ab

    • Wrong, if we do not experience these problems, or at a less obvious level since it affects everyone at the approximate same pace, it is largely due to the Earth's magnetic field which deviates a lot of cosmic rays. Beside that, you should know that cosmic rays that make their way to us can penetrate deep into concrete and Earth's crust. That's why the neutrino observatories are installed in very deep old mines. I doubt any asteroid without a magnetic field can offer a sufficient protection of any kind.

  • Exposure to radiation from space is probabilistic, and there have been many more living human-hours down here on Earth than up in space. Isn't it reasonable to assume that at least a handful of people have been unlucky enough to just *happen* to get bombarded with an unusually high amount of gamma radiation, having the same thing happen to them?

    And then there are all these new-fangled manmade sources of gamma rays that we've been blowing up and/or using for electricity since the 40s...

    • On the other side, it seems like this should fund more research into methods to deflect the path of gamma radiation or transform its state. We know the Earth's atmosphere can do it, so why not develop our own deflection field? After all, we know where most of the gamma rays are coming from, and the rest of them would be just as random as they are here on earth. No need to "block" gamma radiation with something earth-sized; just deflect it enough that it is much less likely to hit a human, and provide a m

    • I think people would expect some isdies, being blasted into space and all

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mc6809e ( 214243 )

      You joke about gamma rays but there isn't much of difference between X rays and gamma rays from a biological perspective.

      I'd be interested in what happens to those that have received several head CT scans. One head CT scan is about 20 years of background radiation.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by itzly ( 3699663 )

      Gamma rays aren't the most dangerous, even if they have high energy, because they don't interact easily with matter. Just as they pass through the atmosphere, they will often also pass through our bodies without causing damage.

      Dangerous space radiation is in the form of high energy protons. They interact easily with matter, so they cause more biological damage, but are also effectively shielded by our thick atmosphere. They aren't shielded very well by a thin metal hull, because a collision with thin metal

  • We'll Know (Score:2, Informative)

    by eyenot ( 102141 )

    We'll Know, now. See, there are two astronauts who happen to be twins. And they have sent one astronaut into outer space and the other astronaut will stay here on Earth. As time passes on board the International Space Station, we will see whether NASA Astronaut Scott Kelly develops strange new neurochemistry the likes of which humanity has never before seen, or if he stays normal like his brother Mark. Time will tell whether this theory about the brains of people in space twisting and contorting in untold s

  • So perhaps the astronauts shouldn't spend all their time standing naked out on the airless surface of Mars, letting the universe blast their noggins with relativistic oxygen and titanium ions (yes, I read the article). If you don't want to get wet, you have to come in out of the rain.
  • Sounds like we can expect Fantastic results!

  • Easy solution (Score:3, Insightful)

    by itzly ( 3699663 ) on Saturday May 02, 2015 @12:30AM (#49598911)

    The solution is easy. Don't send people to Mars, send unmanned rovers. Solves a bunch of other problems too, and saves a lot of money that can be used on other cool stuff.

    • Rovers are cool, but they can't compete with the excitement of a crewed mission. Apollo captivated a generation, and there's not even very much to see on the moon.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by itzly ( 3699663 )

        I think times are different now, with much more sources of entertainment competing for people's attention. A manned Mars mission would be fun for a while, but then people would lose interest and go on with their lives. Also, we didn't have many good pictures of the surface of the moon in the '60s, but we have excellent detailed images and other data from the surface of Mars. In the greater scheme of things, it doesn't really matter if the photo of a Mars rock was taken by a robot or an astronaut.

      • Re:Easy solution (Score:4, Informative)

        by quenda ( 644621 ) on Saturday May 02, 2015 @04:40AM (#49599321)

        Apollo captivated a generation,

        Not for long. TV ratings dropped fast after the first landing. Even blowing up Apollo 13's service module was not enough to save the program from early cancellation.

    • Don't send people to Mars, send unmanned rovers. Solves a bunch of other problems too, and saves a lot of money that can be used on other cool stuff.

      But, as always, you get what you pay for.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by itzly ( 3699663 )

        There's no direct relationship between what you pay and what you get. A dollar spent on an unmanned mission goes much further than a dollar spent on manned missions.

  • Brain goes back to basics, semi zombies go nuts.

    Also, Quake 4. Implants to offset the damage hooked up to central computer creates collective hive mind.

    Suggest they put up a live feed for the inevitable madness to recoup some of the cost of the planned manned flights to Mars.

  • Radiation affects the brain? who would have thunk it!

  • I thought that if we were going anywhere in the Solar system (which I really hope I can see in my lifetime but I doubt it) that it would be wrapped in a lot of mass. For example I thought ice first because it's water and we would be using it. So if we carry a-lot of water that is what we would be using as shielding. Either that or rocks we can gather up *in* space (maybe a lunar space elevator [a moonstalk iirc?]).

    However for our first small ship and given that cosmic radiation may be a lot more energetic

  • I wonder if anyone is addressing this problem by researching how to deflect the space radiation by designing meta-materials, with a negative refraction index, that would function at the specific energies and wavelengths that would cause damage to neurons. This might take decades, but seems like one possible solution. If you can't block the radiation, move it around you.

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