Space

Research in space, helping people on Earth: BioServe marks 100th orbital launch

Daniel William Strain — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 02:54:14 +0000

Research in space, helping people on Earth: BioServe marks 100th orbital launch Daniel William… Mon, 04/21/2025 - 20:54

Daniel Strain

The space shuttle Atlantis lifts off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida—marking BioServe's first launch into orbit. (Credit: NASA)

Louis Stodieck remembers the first time he saw a space shuttle blast off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In April 1991, Stodieck, an aerospace engineer, was the associate director of BioServe Space Technologies, a research center at the University of ��ֱ�� Boulder.

He had helped to design a set of test tubes that would, among other things, not spill the moment they reached space. Stodieck handed the test tubes off to a NASA crew, then watched as his work lifted away from a launchpad aboard the space shuttle Atlantis.

“I never get tired of launches,” said Stodieck, who served as BioServe’s director from 1999 to 2019 and is now its chief scientist. “The sound reaches you seconds after the launch because you’re a few miles away. When it hits you, it’s this low vibration, and you just feel it.”

BioServe founder Marvin Luttges in 1989. (Credit: BioServe)

The BioServe team poses for a photo in 1996. (Credit: BioServe)

A test tube designed for space by BioServe. (Credit: BioServe)

BioServe, which was founded in 1987, works with scientists at companies and research institutions around the world to conduct life science experiments in space.

Today, Stodieck and his colleagues are celebrating a new milestone: BioServe’s 100th launch into orbit.

On Monday, April 21, a SpaceX Dragon capsule lifted off from a similar pad in Florida en route to the International Space Station (ISS). It carried equipment belonging to three research projects, or “payloads,” developed by BioServe. They include several colonies containing billions of bacteria and algae.

“This launch is an amazing milestone,” said Stefanie Countryman, the current director of BioServe. “It exemplifies the hard work of everybody at BioServe, not just our engineers and researchers, but also our students.”

The center has come a long way since that first launch, NASA’s STS-37 mission, in 1991.

Researchers at the center have since sent a wide range of living things into orbit. They include single-celled organisms but also ants, silkworms, mice and an intrepid “spidernaut” named Nefertiti. (An 18-year-old student from Egypt proposed studying whether Nefertiti, a jumping spider, could adjust her hunting techniques in space, which she did). But BioServe has also kept one foot planted on the ground. The center’s research has generated new insights into human medical conditions like bone loss and cancer—and could even lead to facilities in the not-so-distant future that orbit Earth while making human stem cells.

“Space gives us an opportunity to look at organisms in new ways, including how they may express genes differently than they do on Earth,” Countryman said.

Single-celled astronauts

David Klaus, professor at the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, was a graduate student at ��ֱ�� Boulder when BioServe’s first launch took off. From 1985 to 1990, he worked as a shuttle launch controller at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and in Mission Control in Houston. Klaus is set to retire this spring and sees the 100th BioServe launch as a “bookend” on his career.

In those early days, BioServe’s work largely revolved around one challenge of conducting science from hundreds of miles above Earth—open liquids and space don’t mix.

“It’s not like taking two test tubes in a lab on Earth and mixing them together,” Klaus said. “With our early payloads, we were really just trying to figure out how we could manipulate biological fluids in a space environment and get some initial experimental results.”

BioServe began as a 5-year grant from NASA under founder Marvin Luttges, a professor of aerospace engineering sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder. Klaus explained that the center’s space test tubes include up to four sealed chambers. If you push down on a plunger, you can mix the fluids in those chambers one by one, all without exposing them to the air. BioServe has since sent thousands of its test tubes into space, and the basic design remains largely the same.

The team’s early research also revealed something surprising: BioServe scientists discovered that bacteria tend to grow better in space than they do on Earth—perhaps because they’re not being squished down by gravity. A handful of experiments showed that such bacteria could even be transformed into living factories for making anti-cancer drugs.

Astronaut Christina Koch uses a microscope supplied by BioServe aboard the International Space Station. (Credit: NASA)

A lab 250 miles up

In the decades that followed, BioServe’s scientific equipment wound up on NASA’s four space shuttles, the Russian space station Mir and, eventually, the ISS, which entered into orbit in 1998.

Today, astronauts on the ISS can peer through a microscope flight certified and launched by BioServe and grow cell cultures in four incubators called Space Automated Bioproduct Lab (SABL) 1, 2, 3 and 4. BioServe even supplied the refrigerator where humans on the ISS store their food. On the ground, the center runs a mission operation and control center on the ��ֱ�� Boulder campus. There, BioServe staff talk to astronauts in real time on a giant screen.

“We’re replicating the sorts of biological labs that you can find at ��ֱ�� Boulder in space,” said Tobias Niederwieser, a research associate at BioServe.

Astronaut Alexander Gerst loads biological cultures into a SABL incubator on the International Space Station. (Credit: NASA)

Adeline Loesch assembles space "petri dishes" containing biological organisms in a lab on the ��ֱ�� Boulder campus. (Credit: Adeline Loesch)

The center has also collaborated with dozens of space agencies, universities and private companies over its history. On the current launch, for example, a company called Sophie’s Bionutrients based in the Netherlands contracted with the center to examine how algae produce proteins in space—which the company hopes will lead to new kinds of algae-based meat substitutes.

The center’s most lasting contribution to science, however, may be its students. Over the years, hundreds of undergraduate and graduate students at ��ֱ�� Boulder have worked for BioServe. Many have gone on to jobs at NASA and private space companies.

They include Adeline Loesch, a senior studying atmospheric and oceanic sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder. She started working at BioServe between her freshman and sophomore years. These days, she does a little bit of everything for the center: She helps to build the hardware for experiments, assembles them for flight and sits in the operations center as astronauts carry out the research.

In the fall, Loesch will start work in spacecraft and satellite flight operations for Lockheed Martin in ��ֱ��.

“My favorite is watching the projects come full circle during the operations,” Loesch said. “Watching the research being done in real time by astronauts in space is the coolest thing ever.”

Making humans healthier from space

In the end, BioServe’s research in space doesn’t stay in space.

Roughly 24 years ago, for example, Stodieck and his colleagues designed a specialized habitat for mice to live on the ISS. His team’s research has revealed new clues to why mammals lose bone mass when they leave Earth. Those insights, in turn, helped to inspire new kinds of medications for osteoporosis in people.

Niederwieser, meanwhile, is tackling what may be an even more ambitious goal—he and his colleagues are growing human hematopoietic stem cells in space. Doctors often transplant these cells into people to treat cancers like leukemia and lymphoma.

But they’re also tricky and expensive to make on Earth. In a few early experiments, Niederwieser and his colleagues discovered that stem cells, like bacteria, may grow more freely in space. Later this year, his team plans to transport a facility for producing stem cells en masse to the ISS.

That could lead to a new vision for space—one in which stations in orbit around Earth produce various treatments for human illnesses, then send them back to patients on the ground.

“Humans have been on this planet for hundreds of thousands of years and have evolved with only one gravity,” Stodieck said. “It’s really been a privilege to understand how organisms work in another environment.”

Stodieck didn’t travel to Florida for Monday’s launch, but Klaus was there to see SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket roar off the launchpad. Before he left, he was feeling wistful about seeing his old stomping grounds again.

“I'm looking forward to going down there and reminiscing a little bit,” Klaus said. “I’ll drive around and look at the base—a little 40-year flashback to where my career started.”

Beyond the story

Our space impact by the numbers:

19 ��ֱ�� Boulder-affiliated astronauts
No. 1 university recipient of NASA research awards
Only academic research institute in the world to have sent instruments to every planet in the solar system

Follow ��ֱ�� Boulder on LinkedIn

For nearly 40 years, researchers at BioServe Space Technologies at ��ֱ�� Boulder have conducted life science experiments in space—from studying the behavior of spiders in microgravity to producing human stem cells on the International Space Station.

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Did it rain or snow on ancient Mars? New study suggests it did

Daniel William Strain — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 18:28:26 +0000

Did it rain or snow on ancient Mars? New study suggests it did Daniel William… Mon, 04/21/2025 - 12:28

Daniel Strain

Artist's depiction of water rushing into Mars' Jezero Crater, which billions of years ago was the site of a delta. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Visit ancient Mars—a surprisingly temperate planet where snow or rain falls from the sky, and rivers rush down valleys to feed hundreds of lakes.

A new study from geologists at the University of ��ֱ�� Boulder paints this picture of a Red Planet that was relatively warm and wet, much different than the frigid wasteland we know today. The team’s findings suggest that heavy precipitation likely fed many networks of valleys and channels that shaped the Martian surface billions of years ago—adding new evidence to a long-running debate in planetary science.

The researchers, led by Amanda Steckel, who earned her doctorate in geological sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder in 2024, published their findings April 21 in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets.

“You could pull up Google Earth images of places like Utah, zoom out, and you’d see the similarities to Mars,” said Steckel, now at the California Institute of Technology.

Most scientists today agree that at least some water existed on the surface of Mars during the Noachian epoch, roughly 4.1 to 3.7 billion years ago.

But where that water came from has long been a mystery. Some researchers say that ancient Mars wasn’t ever warm and wet, but always cold and dry. At the time, the solar system’s young sun was only about 75% as bright as it is today. Sprawling ice caps may have covered the highlands around the Martian equator, occasionally melting for short periods of time.

In the new research, Steckel and her colleagues set out to investigate the warm-and-wet versus cold-and-dry theories of Mars’ past climate. The team drew on computer simulations to explore how water may have shaped the surface of Mars billions of years ago. They found that precipitation from snow or rain likely formed the patterns of valleys and headwaters that still exist on Mars today.

“It’s very hard to make any kind of conclusive statement,” Steckel said. “But we see these valleys beginning at a large range of elevations. It’s hard to explain that with just ice.”

A detailed map of the topography of Mars at one region near its equator taken by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) instrument on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. (Credit: NASA)

A tale of two red planets

Satellite images of Mars today still reveal the fingerprints of water on the planet.

Around the equator, for example, vast networks of channels spread from Martian highlands, branching like trees and emptying into lakes and even, possibly, an ocean. NASA’s Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in 2021, is currently exploring Jezero Crater, the site of one such ancient lake. During the Noachian, a powerful river emptied into this region, depositing a delta on top of the crater floor.

This image from NASA's Perseverance Rover reveals sandstone at the base of Jezero Crater. Scientists believe this feature was created by water carrying fine grains of rock into the crater. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

“You’d need meters deep of flowing water to deposit those kinds of boulders,” said Brian Hynek, senior author of the study and a scientist at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at ��ֱ�� Boulder.

To study that ancient past, he and Steckel, who now serves on the Perseverance science team, created, essentially, a digital version of a portion of Mars.

The team drew on a computer simulation, or model, originally developed for Earth studies by study co-author Gregory Tucker, a professor at the Department of Geological Sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder. Matthew Rossi, a research scientist at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (��ֱ��) at ��ֱ�� Boulder, also served as a co-author.

The researchers used the software to model the evolution of the landscape on synthetic terrain that resembles Mars close to its equator. In some cases, the group added water to that terrain from falling precipitation. In other cases, the researchers included melting ice caps. Then, in the simulation, they let the water flow for tens to hundreds of thousands of years.

The researchers examined the patterns that formed as a result and, specifically, where the headwaters feeding Mars’ branching valleys emerged. The scenarios produced very different planets: In the case of melting ice caps, those valley heads formed largely at high elevations, roughly around the edge of where the ancient ice sat. In the precipitation examples, Martian headwaters were much more widespread, forming at elevations ranging from below the planet’s average surface to more than 11,000 feet high.

“Water from these ice caps starts to form valleys only around a narrow band of elevations,” Steckel said. “Whereas if you have distributed precipitation, you can have valley heads forming everywhere.”

The team then compared those predictions to actual data from Mars taken by NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey spacecrafts. The simulations that included precipitation lined up more closely with the real Red Planet.

The researchers are quick to point out that the results aren’t the final word on Mars’ ancient climate—in particular, how the planet managed to stay warm enough to support snow or rain still isn’t clear. But Hynek said the study provides scientists with new insights into the history of another planet: our own.

“Once the erosion from flowing water stopped, Mars almost got frozen in time and probably still looks a lot like Earth did 3.5 billion years ago,” he said.

A new study from ��ֱ�� Boulder geologists weighs in on a long-running debate about Mars: Billions of years ago, was the Red Planet warm and wet or cold and dry?

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��ֱ�� Boulder leading 10-university uncrewed aerial systems communications project

Megan Maneval — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 13:15:14 +0000

��ֱ�� Boulder leading 10-university uncrewed aerial systems communications project Megan Maneval Wed, 04/16/2025 - 07:15

Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences

Eric Frew is heading an $8 million project to improve drone communications in anticipation of a future when autonomous aircraft regularly whizz overhead for everything from product deliveries to emergency response.

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Aircrafts of the future: Boosting aerodynamic performance by engineered surface vibrations

Megan Maneval — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 20:33:09 +0000

Aircrafts of the future: Boosting aerodynamic performance by engineered surface vibrations Megan Maneval Thu, 04/03/2025 - 14:33

Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences

Mahmoud Hussein is leading a $7.5 million research grant that is “probably the most radical conceptual advancement for airplanes since the replacement of propellers with jets.”

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Webb telescope captures images, insight from one of Milky Way’s most extreme environments

Daniel William Strain — Wed, 02 Apr 2025 20:44:04 +0000

Webb telescope captures images, insight from one of Milky Way’s most extreme environments Daniel William… Wed, 04/02/2025 - 14:44

Daniel Strain

An image of the Milky Way Galaxy captured by the MeerKAT radio telescope, with an inset showing a detailed image of Sagittarius C taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, SARAO, Samuel Crowe (UVA), John Bally (��ֱ��), Ruben Fedriani (IAA-CSIC), Ian Heywood (Oxford)

Sagittarius C is one of the most extreme environments in the Milky Way Galaxy. This cloudy region of space sits about 200 light-years from the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy. Here, a massive and dense cloud of interstellar gas and dust has collapsed on itself over millions of years to form thousands of new stars.

In a new study, a team of scientists used observations from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to study Sagittarius C in unprecedented detail. The research was led by University of ��ֱ�� Boulder astrophysicist John Bally, Samuel Crowe at the University of Virginia, Rubén Fedriani at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía in Granada and their colleagues

The findings could help solve a long-running mystery about the innermost stretches of the galaxy, or what scientists call the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ): The region hosts high densities of interstellar gas. So why are fewer new stars born here than scientists once predicted?

The researchers discovered that powerful magnetic field lines seem to be threading through Sagittarius C, forming long and bright filaments of hot hydrogen gas that look a little like spaghetti noodles—a phenomenon that could slow down the pace of star formation in the surrounding gas.

“It’s in a part of the galaxy with the highest density of stars and massive, dense clouds of hydrogen, helium and organic molecules” said Bally, professor in the Department of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder. “It’s one of the closest regions we know of that has extreme conditions similar to those in the young universe.”

He and his colleagues published their findings April 2 in The Astrophysical Journal. The research is part of an observation campaign proposed and led by Crowe, a fourth-year undergraduate student at the University of Virginia who was recently named a Rhodes Scholar.

And, Crowe noted, the Webb telescope’s startling images show Sagittarius C as it’s never been seen before.

“Because of these magnetic fields, Sagittarius C has a fundamentally different shape, a different look than any other star forming region in the galaxy away from the galactic center,” Crowe said.

This image of Sagittarius C from the Webb telescope reveals several bands of plasma, which seem to have been formed by strong magnetic fields. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, SARAO, Samuel Crowe (UVA), John Bally (��ֱ��), Ruben Fedriani (IAA-CSIC), Ian Heywood (Oxford)

Stellar nurseries

The research sheds light on the violent births and deaths of stars in the Milky Way Galaxy.

Stars tend to form within what scientists call “molecular clouds,” or regions of space containing dense clouds of gas and dust. The closest such stellar nursery to Earth lies in the Orion Nebula, just below Orion’s belt. There, molecular clouds have collapsed over millions of years, forming a cluster of new stars.

Such active sites of star formation also spell their own demise. As new stars grow, they begin to emit vast amounts of radiation into space. That radiation, in turn, blows away the surrounding cloud, stripping the region of the matter it needs to build more new stars.

“Even the sun, we think, formed in a massive cluster like this,” Bally said. “Over billions of years, all of our sibling stars have drifted away.”

In a separate study published today in the same journal, Crowe and his colleagues, including Bally, dove into the growing “protostars” forming in Sagittarius. Their data reveal a detailed picture of how these young stars are ejecting radiation and blowing away the gas and dust around them.

Magnetic fields

In the study led by Bally, the researchers explored Sagittarius C’s unusual appearance. Bally explained that while the Orion Nebula looks mostly smooth, Sagittarius C is anything but. Weaving in and out of this region are dozens of bright filaments, some several light-years long. These filaments are made up of plasma, a hot gas of charged particles.

“We were definitely not expecting those filaments,” said Rubén Fedriani, a co-author of the study and postdoctoral researcher at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía in Spain. “It was a completely serendipitous discovery.”

Bally noted that the secret to Sagittarius C’s filaments, and the nature of its star formation, likely comes down to magnetic fields.

A supermassive black hole with a mass about four million times greater than our sun sits at the center of the galaxy. The motion of gas swirling around this behemoth can stretch and amplify the surrounding magnetic fields. Those fields, in turn, shape the plasma in Sagittarius C.

Bally suspects that the Orion Nebula looks much smoother because it resides within a much weaker magnetic environment.

Scientists, he added, have long known that the galaxy’s innermost regions are an important birthplace for new stars. But some calculations have suggested that the region should be producing a lot more young stars than observed. In the CMZ, magnetic forces may be strong enough to resist the gravitational collapse of molecular clouds, limiting the rate of new star formation.

Regardless, Sagittarius C’s own time may be drawing to a close. The region’s stars have blown away much of its molecular cloud already, and that nursery could disappear entirely in a few hundred thousand years.

“It’s almost the end of the story,” Bally said.

Beyond the story

Our space impact by the numbers:

19 ��ֱ�� Boulder-affiliated astronauts
No. 1 university recipient of NASA research awards
Only academic research institute in the world to have sent instruments to every planet in the solar system

Follow ��ֱ�� Boulder on LinkedIn

In new images, scientists have gotten the closest look yet at Sagittarius C—a “stellar nursery” where clouds of gas and dust have collapsed to form thousands of new stars.

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Martian dust could pose health risks to future astronauts

Daniel William Strain — Mon, 31 Mar 2025 17:09:15 +0000

Martian dust could pose health risks to future astronauts Daniel William… Mon, 03/31/2025 - 11:09

Daniel Strain

NASA's Curiosity rover reveals the dusty landscape of Mars in this selfie. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)

Don’t breathe in the dust on Mars.

That’s the takeaway from new research from a team of scientists, including researchers from the University of ��ֱ�� Boulder. The findings suggests that long-term exposure to Martian dust could create a host of health problems for future astronauts—leading to chronic respiratory problems, thyroid disease and more.

The study, published in the journal GeoHealth, is the first to take a comprehensive look at the chemical ingredients that make up Martian dust, and their possible impacts on human health. It was undertaken by a team from the worlds of medicine, geology and aerospace engineering.

“This isn't the most dangerous part about going to Mars,” said Justin Wang, lead author of the study and a student in the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. “But dust is a solvable problem, and it’s worth putting in the effort to develop Mars-focused technologies for preventing these health problems in the first place.”

Justin Wang (Credit: Justin Wang)

Justin Wang, left, and Brian Hynek, right, at Turrialba Volcano in Costa Rica. (Credit: Justin Wang)

A dust devil swirls on the surface of Mars as seen from space. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona)

Wang, a ��ֱ�� Boulder alumnus, noted that Apollo era astronauts experienced runny eyes and irritated throats after inhaling dust from the moon. Apollo 17’s Harrison Schmitt likened the symptoms to hay fever.

But scientists know a lot less about the potential harms of Martian dust. To begin to answer that question, Wang and his colleagues drew on data from rovers on Mars and even Martian meteorites to better understand what makes up the planet’s dust. The group discovered a “laundry list” of chemical compounds that could be dangerous for people—at least when inhaled in large quantities and over long periods of time.

They include minerals rich in silicates and iron oxides, metals like beryllium and arsenic and a particularly nasty class of compounds called perchlorates.

In many cases, those ingredients are present in only trace amounts in Mars dust. But the first human explorers on Mars may spend around a year and a half on the surface, increasing their exposure, said study co-author Brian Hynek.

“You’re going to get dust on your spacesuits, and you’re going to have to deal with regular dust storms,” said Hynek, a geologist at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at ��ֱ�� Boulder. “We really need to characterize this dust so that we know what the hazards are.”

Into the bloodstream

One thing is clear, he added: Mars is a dusty place.

Much of the planet is covered in a thick layer of dust rich in tiny particles of iron, which gives the planet its famous red color. Swirling dust storms are common and, in some cases, can engulf the entire globe.

“We think there could be 10 meters of dust sitting on top of the bigger volcanoes,” said Hynek, a professor in the Department of Geological Sciences. “If you tried to land a spacecraft there, you’re going to just sink into the dust.”

Wang found his own way to Martian dust through a unique academic path. He started medical school after earning bachelor’s degrees from ��ֱ�� Boulder in astronomy and molecular, cellular and developmental biology, followed by a master’s degree in aerospace engineering sciences. He currently serves in the Navy through its Health Professions Scholarship Program.

He noted that the biggest problem with Martian dust comes down to its size. Estimates suggest that the average size of dust grains on Mars may be as little as 3 micrometers across, or roughly one-ten-thousandth of an inch.

“That’s smaller than what the mucus in our lungs can expel,” Wang said. “So after we inhale Martian dust, a lot of it could remain in our lungs and be absorbed into our blood stream.”

An ounce of prevention

In the current study, Wang and several of his fellow medical students at USC scoured research papers to unearth the potential toxicological effects of the ingredients in Martian dust.

Some of what they found resembled common health problems on Earth. Dust on Mars, for example, contains large amounts of the compound silica, which is abundant in minerals on our own planet. People who inhale a lot of silica, such as glass blowers, can develop a condition known as silicosis. Their lung tissue becomes scarred, making it hard to breath—symptoms similar to the “black lung” disease that coal miners often contract. Currently, there is no cure for silicosis.

In other cases, the potential health consequences are much less well-known.

Martian dust carries large quantities of highly oxidizing compounds called perchlorates, which are made up of one chlorine and multiple oxygen atoms. Perchlorates are rare on Earth, but some evidence suggests that they can interfere with human thyroid function, leading to severe anemia. Even inhaling a few milligrams of perchlorates in Martian dust could be dangerous for astronauts.

Wang noted that the best time to prepare for the health risks of Martian dust is before humans ever make it to the planet. Iodine supplements, for example, would boost astronauts’ thyroid function, potentially counteracting the toll of perchlorates—although taking too much iodine can also, paradoxically, lead to thyroid disease. Filters specifically designed to screen out Martian dust could also help to keep the air in living spaces clean.

“Prevention is key. We tell everyone to go see their primary care provider to check your cholesterol before it gives you a heart attack,” Wang said. “The best thing we can do on Mars is make sure the astronauts aren’t exposed to dust in the first place.”

Co-authors of the current study include USC medical students Jeremy Rosenbaum, Ajay Prasad and Robert Raad; Esther Putnam, former graduate student in aerospace engineering sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder now at SpaceX; Andrea Harrington at the NASA Johnson Space Center; and Haig Aintablian, director of the Space Medicine Program at the University of California, Los Angeles, also affiliated with SpaceX.

Beyond the story

Our space impact by the numbers:

19 ��ֱ�� Boulder-affiliated astronauts
No. 1 university recipient of NASA research awards
Only academic research institute in the world to have sent instruments to every planet in the solar system

Follow ��ֱ�� Boulder on LinkedIn

Inhaling dust particles from the Red Planet over long periods of time could put humans at risk of developing respiratory issues, thyroid disease and other health problems.

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Aerospace engineers to study motion sickness in space

Daniel William Strain — Mon, 24 Mar 2025 17:15:43 +0000

Aerospace engineers to study motion sickness in space Daniel William… Mon, 03/24/2025 - 11:15

Daniel Strain

Fram2 astronauts Rabea Rogge and Jannicke Mikkelsen train for their upcoming space mission. (Credit: Fram2)

Don’t tell Neil Armstrong, but giant leaps for mankind may leave astronauts feeling a little queasy.

In a new experiment, aerospace engineers at the University of ��ֱ�� Boulder will work with astronauts to study how people experience motion sickness when they travel to space—with an eye toward reducing these sometimes debilitating symptoms.

The research is part of the first-of-its-kind Fram2 mission, a human spaceflight mission that will orbit Earth from above its poles to explore these regions in new ways. The mission’s four-person crew will spend 3-5 days on-orbit aboard SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft. It’s targeted to launch March 31 on a Falcon 9 rocket from Florida.

Torin Clark, associate professor in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at ��ֱ�� Boulder, explained that motion sickness in space is a common problem—although not necessarily one that many early astronauts talked about. An estimated 60-80% of space explorers have experienced at least some nausea during their first few days away from Earth. Astronaut Frank Borman, for example, vomited less than 24 hours into the Apollo 8 mission to the moon, creating a mess for him and his crewmates to clean up.

As the space tourism industry ramps up, those bouts of queasiness could become a more urgent issue.

Torin Clark

“In the past, most astronauts have been carefully selected by NASA, including many military pilots,” said Clark, who’s leading the motion sickness experiment for ��ֱ�� Boulder. “We don’t know much about how the general public will respond to these gravity transitions.”

Clark and his colleagues simulate those dynamics in experiments on the ��ֱ�� Boulder campus. The researchers, for example, spin volunteers in circles on a centrifuge machine the size of a room. They also put test subjects in a device called a “sled” that slides back and forth to mimic how a space capsule might bob in the ocean upon its return to Earth.

The Fram2 mission represents an opportunity to explore motion sickness in a real space environment. The mission gets its name from the Fram ship, which was built in the late 1800s and helped to carry early Norwegian explorers like Roald Amundsen and Otto Sverdrup to the planet’s polar regions. The Fram2 crew consists of Mission Commander Chun Wang, Vehicle Commander Jannicke Mikkelsen, Mission Pilot Rabea Rogge, and Mission Specialist and Medical Officer Eric Philips.

Throughout the mission, the crew members will perform a series of exercises at regular intervals. They will tilt their heads side to side and forward and back four times, motions that can stimulate symptoms of motion sickness. The crew will then fill out surveys, which Clark and his colleagues will analyze back on Earth to gauge how motion sickness evolves as humans spend time in space.

“We want to quantify the dynamics of space motion sickness: When does it start? How soon does it go back down?” Clark said. “We also want to understand how astronauts experience motion sickness when they come back to Earth because some research suggests that it might be worse than in space.”

Clark led a similar experiment during the Polaris Dawn mission, which launched last year with a four-person crew, including ��ֱ�� Boulder alumna Sarah Gillis. Eventually, Clark and his colleagues hope to inform strategies for preventing motion sickness in space. That might include improved procedures for administering anti-nausea medications or training exercises that astronauts can do on the ground to prepare for the rigors of space.

“This issue may not be as big of a deal for going to Mars because symptoms will dissipate over long-duration missions,” Clark said. “But for shorter, commercial missions, it can make people feel pretty crummy.”

Beyond the story

Our space impact by the numbers:

19 ��ֱ�� Boulder-affiliated astronauts
No. 1 university recipient of NASA research awards
Only academic research institute in the world to have sent instruments to every planet in the solar system

Follow ��ֱ�� Boulder on LinkedIn

The historic Fram2 mission will explore how astronauts get motion sickness and what they can do about it.

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��ֱ��riosity: Can humans handle the stress of traveling to Mars?

Daniel William Strain — Wed, 19 Mar 2025 19:47:49 +0000

��ֱ��riosity: Can humans handle the stress of traveling to Mars? Daniel William… Wed, 03/19/2025 - 13:47

Daniel Strain

In ��ֱ��riosity, experts across the ��ֱ�� Boulder campus answer pressing questions about humans, our planet and the universe beyond.

This week, Katya Arquilla, assistant professor in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, looks into the question: “Can humans handle the stress of traveling to Mars?”

NASA astronaut Suni Williams aboard the International Space Station in October 2024. (Credit: NASA)

Previously in ��ֱ��riosity

What causes the runner’s high?

Editor's note: This article, originally published on Nov. 13, 2024, was updated to reflect the safe return of Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to Earth.

On March 18, 2025, a space capsule carrying NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams splashed down in the waters off the coast of Florida. The event marked the end of the duo's 9-month stay aboard the International Space Station.

It was a little longer than they had planned. NASA had originally intended for the astronauts to spend only a week in space, but technical issues befell the Boeing Starliner space capsule Wilmore and Williams had ridden on.

If spending nine months on the ISS, which measures just 5,000 square feet, sounds like a recipe for frayed nerves, it may very well be. That’s according to Arquilla, an engineer who has studied how long space journeys can affect the mental health of humans.

“On long-duration space missions, there are many stressors that create the potential for negative mental health effects,” she said. “From data taken in research facilities in extreme environments on Earth, like Antarctica, we have seen symptoms of depression, anxiety and stress.”

A future mission to Mars, however, could be a lot more than eight months, potentially as much as three years. Which raises the question: Can humans handle that much time in space?

Arquilla thinks so, but there are caveats.

“It will be a big challenge,” she said. “There’s a lot we don’t know because we haven’t sent people to Mars before. They won’t be able to look down and see the Earth the way they can on the International Space Station.”

In previous research, Arquilla and her colleagues explored the mental health consequences of that kind of isolation through an unlikely event here on Earth—the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2020, millions of Americans were suddenly cooped up in their homes with the threat of a major disease hanging over their heads. The researchers conducted a survey and observed that people with military training or other experience in stressful environments tended to be more productive during the pandemic than others. But those experienced individuals didn’t appear to maintain their mental health better than less experienced people.

Katya Arquilla

Arquilla noted that simply being aware of your own body, and knowing when stress sets in, can help. She has partnered with Laura Devendorf, a researcher at ��ֱ�� Boulder’s ATLAS Institute, to assist people in doing that kind of monitoring. The team integrated sensors into comfortable textiles that track electrocardiogram (ECG) signals coming from wearers’ hearts.

“Maybe I'm an astronaut on a mission and I'm tracking my own signals, and I see that my heartrate starts to go up,” Arquilla said. “I could decide based on that that I should take a break for a couple of hours.”

This research won’t just help astronauts. Arquilla is also exploring how similar technologies could give people on the ground tools to detect and manage symptoms of mental health changes in high-stress environments. That might include wilderness expeditions, remote research facilities and military deployments.

She’s glad to see people talking more about mental health, both on Earth and in space.

“We all, after the pandemic, understand the importance of mental health a lot more than we did maybe 10 years ago,” she said. “Being able to recognize that it's okay to not feel at 100% all the time, and being able to give people the tools they need to articulate what is wrong, is really important.”

As humans spend longer and longer in space, the mental health of astronauts will become increasingly important, says aerospace engineer Katya Arquilla. Her research could help people in orbit and on the ground.

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Advancing real-time data compression for supercomputer research

Megan Maneval — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 19:31:16 +0000

Advancing real-time data compression for supercomputer research Megan Maneval Mon, 03/17/2025 - 13:31

Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences

Alireza Doostan is leading a $1.2 million effort for real-time data compression for supercomputer research.

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LASP: Every planet and beyond

Megan Maneval — Mon, 10 Mar 2025 14:24:54 +0000

LASP: Every planet and beyond Megan Maneval Mon, 03/10/2025 - 08:24

Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics

NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft just whipped around Mars carrying the LASP-built SUDA instrument. When it arrives at its destination in 2030, it won’t be the first time a LASP instrument has been to Jupiter. In fact, LASP instruments have been to every planet in our solar system and beyond.

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Space

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