Neurovestibular Adaptation Integrated Research Team -- Team Goals

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Team Goals

TEAM GOALS

The Team's goal is to better understand how space travel affects human balance and orientation, how inflight disorientation, space motion sickness and postlanding vertigo and locomotion problems can be reduced.
The human balance system has evolved to take advantage of Earth's gravity cues coming from the vestibular organs of the inner ear. When the downward reference provided by gravity is missing, about two thirds of astronauts and cosmonauts experience disorientation and space motion sickness. Happily, susceptibility to space sickness usually only lasts several days. Nonetheless, crew members continue to occasionally experience visual illusions and three dimensional navigation problems. Upon returning to Earth's gravity, many also have balance problems, and must re-adapt to 1-G. During the first hours after return, most astronauts have difficulty walking, and some feel quite dizzy and cannot even stand up. The world can seem tilted, and appear to move when the head is turned or tilted. After 1-2 week Shuttle flights, crew members usually feel back to normal within a day or two, but after many months in space, disequilibrium can be severe and long lasting enough to present a safety concern. Crews returning from months aboard the MIR station usually have required assistance in exiting their spacecraft ( follow the link to download a Quicktime movie). The severity of disequilibrium varies between people, for reasons that are not fully understood. On a two year mission to Mars, neurovestibular adaptation problems will probably be even more significant, particularly if the decision is made to employ artificial gravity. Marsbound crewmembers may have to repeatedly transition from 0-g to 0.3-g or 1-g, and adapt to the additional Coriolis accelerations produced by spacecraft or centrifuge rotation. The NSBRI Neurovestibular Adaptation Team's current projects address these issues focusing on describing how the body's balance and orientation systems adapt to novel gravireceptor and visual cues during and after long duration spaceflight (follow the link above to view a diagram of the Team's objectives and focuses). This basic research represents the essential first step in the scientific development of neurovestibular countermeasures, including preflight and inflight training, and postflight rehabilitation techniques. NSBRI neurovestibular research may also help clinicians treat patients suffering from diseases of the inner ear or brain balance centers. The team's spaceflight countermeasures focus thus complements concurrent NASA , NIH and NIH-NSBRI basic and clinical neurovestibular research programs.