A new study conducted on the International Space Station (ISS) reveals that microgravity significantly impacts heart tissue. Researchers found that exposure to space's low-gravity environment weakens heart tissue and its ability to maintain a steady rhythm.
It’s no secret that spending extended periods in space takes a toll on the human body. For years, NASA and other space agencies have been researching the effects of microgravity on humans, animals, and plants aboard the. So far, the research has shown that being in space for long periods leads to muscle atrophy, bone density loss, changes in vision, gene expression, and psychological issues.
To create this payload, the team relied on human-induced pluripotent stem cells , which can become many types of cells, to produce cardiomyocytes . These resulting tissues were placed in a miniaturized bioengineered tissue chip designed to mimic the environment of an adult human heart. The chips would then collect data on how the tissues would rhythmically contract, imitating how the heart beats.
When the tissue chambers returned to Earth, he and his colleagues continued to maintain and collect data from the samples to see if there was any change in their abilities to contract. In addition to losing strength, the muscle tissues developed arrhythmias, consistent with age-related heart conditions. In a healthy human heart, the time between beats is about a second, whereas the tissue samples lasted nearly five times as long – though they returned to nearly normal once returned to Earth.
Space Exploration Microgravity Heart Health ISS NASA
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