Space mystery: UK sends 70,000 worms into orbit to unlock secrets of Moon, Mars and beyond
2Space mystery: UK sends 70,000 worms into orbit to unlock secrets of Moon, Mars and beyond
THOUSANDS of microscopic worms have been shipped up to the International Space Station (ISS) to help researchers learn why muscles deteriorate in low gravity.
Astronauts serving on expeditions to the ISS tend to spend around six months on the orbiting laboratory, and endure prolonged exposure to a microgravity environment. These conditions have various effects on the human body — from causing bodily fluids to shift headwards, to a loss of 1–1.5 percent of mineral density in weight-bearing bones per month, and the gradual decrease of muscle mass thanks to the reduced exercise. In space, our bones and muscles no longer have to support our bodies in the same way that they do on Earth, so they begin to atrophy away.
In fact, studies have shown that a three to six month stint in space can lead to a whopping 30 percent reduction in muscle mass.
Returning from the ISS following recent missions, both astronauts Tim Peake of the European Space Agency and Mark Vander Hei were seen needing assistance to walk.
And was even with a daily regimen of aerobic and resistance exercises on board the orbiting laboratory — without this, astronauts could potentially experience irreversible bone and muscle loss.
This is a concern not just for astronauts visiting the ISS, but also for humanity’s future ambitions in space — with scientists having their eye on long-duration missions to Mars, for example, and even further out into space.
To learn more about how these changes occur — and what might be done to prevent them — researchers led from the University of Exeter and funded by the UK have been sending tiny worms up into space.
The species in question — C. elegans — are commonly used by biologists as model organisms, as they share many essential characteristics with humans.
The other advantage of using these worms is that because they are so small, thousands of them can be taken up to the space station at a time.
Physiologist Dr Colleen Deane of the University of Exeter told Science Digest that some 70,000 of the tiny worms have already been sent up into orbit by the UK team.
She added: “These tiny worms, although they look very different to us, and you need a microscope to see them, they are actually very, very similar to humans and the way that our muscles work.
“The genes that worms have — so, the molecules that they have that are their instructions for building — they have 80 percent of those [that] are similar to us.”
The worms are also very easy for astronauts to maintain on the space station.
Dr Deane said: “As soon as the capsule docks with the International Space Station, and the astronaut takes the worms out, they transfer the experimental sets which have the worms into a cubic incubator.
“And what that does is it keeps our worms at 20 degrees. “So, actually, the astronauts don’t have to do much in terms of interaction.”
She quipped: “They don’t have to play with them or anything like that!”
After spending five-to-six days in the incubator, Dr Deane explains, the worms are transferred to a freezer where they remain until they are brought back to Earth for analysis.”
For Dr Deane, the research on the worms is, in many ways, really just beginning.
She said: “We still have some of our samples which we’re currently analysing, so it’s really exciting to see what we get.
“That will help us understand a bit more about muscle loss, what therapies might help — and will probably lead to more questions than answers, most likely.
“The key thing would be continuing to drive it forward. We do know that people want to go to Mars, we do know that people want to go to the Moon.
“So, if we can ultimately see some of our experiments on these platforms, I think that’s really exciting to me.”