PILOT STUDY OF ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY AS A MULTI-SYSTEM COUNTERMEASURE TO BED REST

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This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. The purpose of this study is to test how a force created by spinning the space craft could be used to replace gravity during long space flights. For this study, the "artificial gravity" will be created by spinning subjects on a human centrifuge and space flight will be simulated by prolonged bed rest. Bed rest with the head tilted down slightly below the feet is a good way for researchers to imitate the changes that occur in a person's body while traveling in space without gravity. In this study, subjects will be confined to 21 days of 24 hours a day bed rest, with the head tilted down slightly to experience some of the changes an astronaut's body goes through during 21 days of weightless space flight. During those 21 days subjects will not get out of bed; however, once a day they will be wheeled on a gurney to the centrifuge facility. There, treatment subjects will spend 1 hr spinning on the centrifuge and control subjects will spend 1 hr on the centrifuge without spinning. Scientists will measure the functioning of many of the body systems before, during, and after bed rest to learn how an astronaut's body will change in weightlessness during space flight in the future, and how artificial gravity might be used to protect astronauts from some of the changes their bodies go through.