Spending a lot of time in space leads to brain cell damage.
- Negative changes from space travel include atrophic muscles, decreased bone mass, deterioration of vision, and altered bacterial flora in the gut.
- Blood samples from five cosmonauts revealed the presence of several biomarkers of brain damage.
After billionaires Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson, it’s actor William Shatner’s turn to take off for space. A wink for the one who played Captain Kirk in the Star Trek series which takes place aboard a spaceship. But if space travel is increasing, it is not trivial. As proof, a new study conducted by Swedish researchers from the University of Gothenburg on five Russian cosmonauts published on October 11 in the journal JAMA Neurology reveals that these trips lead to brain damage.
Going into space, effects on bones, muscles, eyes and intestine
The adverse effects on the body of long periods in space have been known for some time. Negative changes include atrophic muscles, a decrease in bone mass, deterioration of vision or even an alteration of the bacterial flora in the intestine. But no effect on the brain had been noted.
Scientists tracked five Russian cosmonauts, average age 49, who worked on the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits 400 km above the Earth’s surface. They took blood samples 20 days before their departure to the ISS where they spent an average of 169 days, or five and a half months. After they returned to Earth, follow-up blood samples were taken three times: one day, one week, and about three weeks respectively after landing.
A first
By analyzing five biomarkers of brain damage, the researchers found the presence in significantly high concentrations of three of them. These are neurofilament lumen (NFL), glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), and beta-amyloid protein Aβ40. “This is the first time concrete evidence of brain cell damage has been documented in blood tests following spaceflightadvance Henrik Zetterberg, professor of neuroscience and one of the two main co-authors of the study. This needs to be further explored and avoided if space travel is to become more frequent in the future..”
The causes of these brain disorders are not yet known. “To get there, we need to help each other find out why the damage is happening.continues Henrik Zetterberg. Is it weightlessness, changes in brain fluid, or stressors associated with launching and landing, or is it caused by something else? Here tons of exciting human studies experiments can be done on Earth. If we can determine the causes of the damage, the biomarkers we have developed can help us find the best way to remedy the problem..”
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