[ExI] Hibernation for human space travel not possible

BillK pharos at gmail.com
Tue May 3 14:21:02 UTC 2022


On Tue, 3 May 2022 at 14:27, Dave S via extropy-chat
<extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
> On Mon, May 2, 2022 at 7:11 PM BillK via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>
>> The article is mainly concerned with very long space trips. Weight
>> loss during hibernation is about five pounds per year, which becomes
>> significant on multi-year trips.
>
>
> Weight loss would be expected to be about five pounds if humans could hibernate like other animals, which they can't. Animals also can't hibernate for years.
>
> -Dave
> _______________________________________________


Agreed - that's what the original article says. They are discussing
what might be possible for future long-term space flights.
They also point out that there are ethical problems concerning
potential research on hibernation in humans.
“Who will be the volunteer for testing a drug, genetic modification,
or a surgery for inducing hibernation?” says Nespolo.

Present day medically induced coma with patients on a ventilator
becomes very risky if longer than a few days to one week. One of the
longest surviving patients is Michael Schumacher, who was in a medical
coma for almost two months after his brain injury accident.
For future astronauts, as well as muscle weakness, there is also bone
strength loss to contend with. It may be that 'hibernating' astronauts
would have to be maintained in an artificial gravity module rotating
around the spaceship.


BillK



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