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Thank you for visiting our website. We are a relatively small lab with big ideas. We are part of a much larger group of investigators known collectively as the LLUMC Molecular Radiation Biology Laboratories. It is our hope that this website will educate, communicate, and incite scientific debate. As the PI of our little group, I hope to post our data and discuss potential mechanisms, consequences, and countermeasures. With a bit of luck we'll all learn something. The links to the left include our merry band as well as collaborating investigators and laboratories. The links to the right include our archive and blogroll. The banner above will always bring you back to the main page page. Take a look around and please feel free to leave a comment on our blog (try to keep it civil and constructive) or shoot us an e-mail. - Michael " Ubertramp " Pecaut
When a busted toilet could be a major catastrophe…
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2008.05.29
Categories & Tags: Astronaut Health,Bacteria,Current Events,Immunity,International Space Station,Microgravity,Radiation
Comments: 3
Most of you have probably heard by now that the toilet in the Russian-built Zvezda module of the International Space Station is on the fritz. Solid waste is ok. Liquid waste ain’t. Basically, the vacuum pump doesn’t suck when it’s supposed to due to a “‘fabrication flaw’ in the toilet’s compressor units.”
NASA says they have worked out a way to keep things running up there until the Space Shuttle Discovery arrives with replacement parts…which may or may not fix the problem permanently. And by running, I mean, it requires half an hour and two astronauts to make sure everything is rinsed, decontaminated, and flushed properly.
On Earth, that’s a relatively minor problem. In orbit, it can be a serious problem, but fixable. In open space, it could be a major disaster. And here’s why.
First off, like any space craft, the ISS is a tin can floating in a vacuum; an ecologically closed system. Which means everything you bring with you stays there. And although there are fans, temperature and humidity controls, and air filters on board, environmental control is far from perfect.
For example, because of the nature of microgravity, air doesn’t move like it moves around on Earth. Basically, it just sits there unless it’s forced to move. There will inevitably be some “dead spaces” on board where air doesn’t move much. Perfect environments for fungus and bacteria. Throw in a busted toilet, and you can imagine what kind of havoc that might cause. Liquid waste could float around the space station, and eventually end up in one of these dead spaces, providing the perfect substrate for biological nasties. Not only is this a health issue, but it could also cause problems with on board electronics, biological experiments, and life support. (Not to mention totally destroying your chances of scoring with any green skinned alien hawtie that happens to share your orbit…)
The biological hazards are compounded by the effects of the spaceflight environment on human physiology. Likely, you’ve heard that living in microgravity for prolonged periods of time can cause muscle and bone atrophy. But microgravity can also cause problems with immunity: decreasing white blood cell counts, screwing up normal immune functions like proliferation and phagocytosis, and reactivating latent viruses. We’ve reported on some of this here, here, and here. This is on top of the effects of mission related psychological stress and hormonal changes due to fluid shifts…
All of that is just what happens in Earth’s neighborhood. On a trip to Mars, beyond the protective Van Allen belts, astronauts will also have to deal with radiation. Between the constant low-dose/low-dose-rate radiation of the Galactic Cosmic Rays, and the fairly random and un-predictable high-dose-rate Solar Particle Events (aka solar flares and coronal mass ejections), exposures will likely be significantly greater for astronauts in space than most of us will ever see on the ground. Count on it, radiation WILL be a factor.
As shown here, here, here, and here, radiation can have a dramatic impact in immune function. And many of the parameters screwed up in microgravity are also screwed up by radiation. So, there is the potential for additive effects. Or worse yet, synergy, where the effects are greater than the sum of the parts.
So here’s the scenario. You’re on the way to Mars. You’ve been out there for about 3 months already so your muscles and bones are slowly melting away. You just got hit by a solar flare while outside the space craft fixing a broken antennae. The stress levels are pretty high because the nearest RadioShack is a million miles away. And now your toilet backs up.
See what I mean?
3 Responses to “When a busted toilet could be a major catastrophe…”
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May 30th, 2008 at 9:05 am
[...] launched a new blog, as it were. In it, he takes a detailed look at why this kind of problem has potentially catastrophic implications for our [...]
May 30th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Mike,
A terrific beginning to your blog. Thanks for doing this.
I’d never thought about air circulation in microgravity. What you describe puts the risks in far greater perspective than CNN’s Miles O’Brien does.
Cheers.
May 30th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Thanks. Obviously, I’m still working out some kinks in the code, but hopefully things will get smoother as we go.
As for risk, well, think of it this way. After President Bush’s speech in 2001 about going back to the Moon and on to Mars, a lot of NASA’s funding got reallocated to answering engineering type questions. That meant a lot of the important biology type research suddenly didn’t have funds. However, NASA felt that radiation could be a potential show stopper. So funding for that area of research underwent the least amount of cuts. We still got hit pretty bad, just not as bad as, say gravitational physiology.