Science: Bioastronautics for Survival

In a week marked by the spectacular results of man’s first photo reconnaissance of Mars, the ambitions of the scientists and engineers at the San Francisco meeting of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics seemed modest indeed. Topic “A” was the civilization of near-space—the techniques by which astronauts may live and work in the neighboring sky this side of the moon.

No one was deceived. Solving the complex problems involved has already proved to be a massive and costly undertaking. And there is a $1 billion contract at stake for whichever one of four contending aerospace companies (Boeing, Douglas, General Electric or Lockheed) gets the Government’s order to build the Air Force’s Manned Orbiting Laboratory—once Defense Secretary Robert McNamara makes up his mind that it should be built.

Question of Endurance. The purpose of the MOL project is to investigate the problems of manned space voyages that may last as long as two months. A pressurized cylinder about the size of a small house trailer, 10 ft. in diameter and 20 to 30 ft. long, the MOL would be heaved into orbit by the 2,400,000-lb. thrust of an Air Force Titan IIIC booster. But the size, shape and orbit of the capsule are the least of anyone’s concern in a profession that already talks of manned journeys to the moon and beyond. It is the experiments that the occupants of a MOL will perform during its prolonged flight that are remarkable. As an Air Force project, MOL has definite military goals. It could be used for spy-in-the-sky surveillance, nuclear-test detection, target reconnaissance and weather reporting. But equipped with cameras, radar and infra-red sensors, a manned space station could have endless peaceful uses. It could map ocean currents, help locate underground water, experiment with modifying the weather, and take improved pictures of the stars and planets. At San Francisco, for example, International Business Machines engineers suggested that an orbiting laboratory 200 miles above the earth could complete in two days a global survey of all land under cultivation, even distinguishing between corn and wheat and oats, and spotting plant diseases before they are visible to the human eye. It would take a fleet of 50 planes as long as 20 years to do the same job.

Behind all the schemes is an all-important question: How well can man take the rigors of an extended stay in orbit? On such flights, men will endure far more than Mercury or Gemini crews ever did. They will suffer prolonged weightlessness, radiation, fear, prolonged states of alert, close confinement, disruption of normal day-night and work-rest cycles. They will live for long periods on reclaimed water and in a recycled atmosphere. And always there will be monotony, fatigue and the oppressive loneliness of space. “We simply don’t have enough experience to say with any certainty what man’s abilities or limitations in space will be,” says Major General Don R. Ostrander, head of the Air Force Office of Aerospace Research. “The only way we are going to find out what man can and cannot do in space is to put him up there and require him to conduct some meaningful experiments.”

This is the challenge of the new scientific discipline of bioastronautics, the science of how to keep man alive and happy in space. Among the more serious problems that must be met:

· WEIGHTLESSNESS. Under zero-G, away from the familiar pull of earth, the heart does less work and blood vessels lose their tone; the bones, not required to meet the stresses of exercise and body weight, lose calcium. One solution is simply to provide astronauts with exercising equipment, such as the elastic cord used by Gemini crews. Boeing has devised an on-board trampoline and an exercising unicycle. Boeing and Douglas are both experimenting with on-board centrifuges to be used as conditioners. They have put a man on a 10-ft. board, spun it around at various speeds up to 90 r.p.m. to simulate a tug at the heart as high as 4 Gs. Such force, they report, tones the body without causing disorientation. General Electric is working on still another system, but it is a deep company secret. In a study for NASA, North American Aviation proposed linking the capsule and burned-out booster by extendable tubes. By using the capsule’s small thruster rockets, the booster and the capsule could be set in rotation around an axis, generating the effect of gravity in the cabin.

· CONFINEMENT. The risk of claustrophobia or other emotional disturbances is everpresent. Unlike the Gemini capsule, however, the MOL will be designed to give astronauts a little room to walk around in. They will also have to keep busy. In simulations of cabin conditions, Douglas has run student volunteers through a rigid routine of eight hours’ work, eight hours’ sleep and eight hours of recreation for periods of as long as 30 days. They came through sane and sound. Even so, Lockheed is programming a computer to check periodically on the alertness and judgment of subjects in a simulated cabin by asking them to solve simple arithmetic problems and distinguish between two geometric patterns.

· LIFE SUPPORT. Engineers have now licked the problem of supplying water for long flights by using the byproduct from fuel cells and by distilling perspiration and urine. The distillation process is so efficient that nearly 100% of the liquid can be collected, purified and reused. Deciding what the astronauts should breathe is more complex. Pure oxygen, taken over long periods, irritates the mucous passages, may damage lung tissue, and is a fire hazard. Researchers are experimenting with two-gas combinations—either oxygen-nitrogen, such as the Russians use, or oxygen-helium. Though helium would help cool the cabin, it has one drawback: breathing it raises communication complications by causing a weird rise in the pitch of the voice, known as the “Donald Duck effect.” For added trouble, there is more contamination than that caused by the carbon dioxide from an astronaut’s breath. Engineers must also take into account ammonia and water vapor in perspiration, the hydrogen sulphide, methane, nitrogen and carbon dioxide of flatus, and the minute secretions of toxic compounds “outgassing” from the plastics and rubber inside the cabin. For carbon compounds, the impregnated charcoal of filter cigarettes does the trick. For the others, there is a small incinerator called a catalytic oxidizer. Lockheed is testing a comprehensive life-support system that controls the heat, humidity and composition of the cabin atmosphere, takes out the carbon dioxide and other contaminants, regulates cabin pressure, distills and purifies water from urine. Then there is the nasty but necessary business of waste disposal. Douglas is working on a “Zero-G Commode,” and G.E. is developing a “Hydrojohn.” Both would remove the water for reuse, dry out the fecal matter and kill the bacteria. The residue? Astronauts might wrap it in sanitary bags and hide it away in used food containers. Or, being a good absorber of radiation, it might be stored around the walls of the capsule as an added radiation shield. It may be necessary to jettison the stuff into perpetual orbit—a possibility that leads bioastronautics men to postulate a new belt above the earth to rival the Van Allen radiation phenomenon. They call it the fecal belt.

· METEOROIDS & RADIATION. Cosmic debris, from pea-sized pellets to good-sized rocks hurtling at 20,000 m.p.h., bombards near-space. Fortunately, space is so big that the odds of a damaging impact on a man outside the cabin run about 1 in 1,000,000. In simulating the effect of these meteoroids on the capsule, Boeing has found that aluminum is the best material for the double-walled hull of the MOL. But astronauts must also worry about radiation showers from solar flares, which are eruptions on the sun that spew out a stream of high-energy particles, to say nothing of the electrons and protons trapped in the Van Allen belt. Below this belt, man is safe; he only runs into trouble if he is in the belt or travels beyond it. The problem now is to predict solar flares so that they can be avoided. Present lead time in forecasting: one week.

· UNTESTED BUT UNDAUNTED. The problems of spending months in space are still staggering, and much of the technology for solving them remains largely untested. Unforeseen hazards will surely complicate matters. But among aerospace scientists and engineers, confidence runs high that all the difficulties can be mowed down as they arise. The motivation is strong: big money for the aerospace industry and high adventure for man.