If born in space, can humans live normally on Earth?

Biological processes in the weightless environment take place in a different way than on Earth, adaptive mechanisms in the human body must be rebuilt. Therefore, people born in space travel can hardly live normally on Earth.

Russian scientists are trying to understand at the molecular level whether these changes are reversible, and whether humans can return to normal life after a long space flight.

Life in a state of weightlessness

The main risk factors in space are cosmic radiation and the weightless environment. Because the orbit of the International Space Station (ISS) coincides with low-altitude orbit, Earth's magnetic field protects astronauts from radiation. However, scientists have not yet created an artificial gravitational field.

People born in space travel hardly have a normal life on Earth.

After orbiting, many astronauts complained of headaches, dizziness, nausea, disorientation, and decreased appetite. This is space-adapted syndrome (SAS), also known as cosmic disease, after a few days everything will disappear. But they also experience muscle atrophy, bone demineralization, impaired vision and circulatory disturbances in the weightless environment.

Astronauts lose up to 1.5% of their bone mass each month. Osteoporosis is an inherent condition that astronauts always face when performing missions in space for a long time.

Bone density continues to decline even after a year of living aboard the ISS. The muscles that provide the vertebrae fit together weaken, so the height of the astronaut increases by 3 to 5 cm.

While in orbit, astronauts do not feel this. Problems arose after returning to Earth. Gravity "squeezes" the vertebrae causing pain, every movement is difficult. And the longer an astronaut is in weightlessness, the harder it is for him to return to normal life on Earth.

Cosmonaut Oleg Kotov, Deputy Scientific Director of the Research Institute of Biomedical Problems (IMBP) of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said: "Rehabilitation is a long process. The acute phase lasts two weeks, up to three weeks. After 7-10 days, astronauts can live at home, do normal things. Time to recover, for the body to fully return to the state. normal physiology depends on the characteristics of the individual".

Protein can alter biological activity

Scientists still do not know what will happen to the human body after a few years in space, whether humans can fully recover or not. IMBP scientists are working on this problem.

At the molecular level, the process of adapting to any external conditions affects mainly the composition of the proteins that are synthesized.

For about 15 years now, scientists at the IMBP Institute's Protein Laboratory, headed by Doctor of Medical Sciences Professor Irina Larina, have been studying the proteins present in the biological fluids of astronauts includes: blood, urine, saliva, exhaled gas condensate.

Scientists know well how each protein can affect the human body, so they can determine which processes are affected. The researchers hope to find molecular targets in the transfection chain - substances that, by acting on them, they will find a way to stop bone destruction and reduce muscle mass.

Settle in the universe

In microgravimetry, the genes synthesize the same proteins. However, then, according to scientists, chemical changes occur, and this often affects functions. For example, the scientists found that, in orbitals more proteins have more oxidized forms.

Professor Larina explains: 'For example, if before flight a protein is oxidized at two points, then it is oxidized at 10 points later. The molecules are the same, but have different structures, which means they work in different ways.

The job of the protein is to transmit the signal to where it binds to the receiving cell. If the protein was folded in a different way, it wouldn't transmit anything, or would transmit a different signal."

In every human raised on Earth, biological processes recover fairly quickly after spaceflight, but, scientists still don't know what will happen to people born in space.

Experiments on mice show that, in space, conception and pregnancy in mammals take place normally. The experiment produced healthy young mice.

If left in space, they will give rise to new generations born in a zero-gravity environment. But, they are unlikely to return to live on Earth.

In weightlessness, blood, like everything else, loses weight. In space-born animals, the heart does not have the necessary cardiac muscles to function in the conditions of gravity, the blood vessels are very thin.

Therefore, if in the future man sets out to make a long interplanetary flight and has a multi-generational family on the space station, it will be another person - the cosmic man.