Is space tourism safe or do civilians risk health effects?

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

30-Oct-2014

Contact: Kathryn Ryan kryan@liebertpub.com 914-740-2100 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News @LiebertOnline

Rochelle, NY, October 30, 2014Several companies are developing spacecraft designed to take ordinary citizens, not astronauts, on short trips into space. "Space tourism" and short periods of weightlessness appear to be safe for most individuals according to a series of articles on space biomedicine published in New Space, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The articles are available free on the New Space website until November 30, 2014.

James Vanderploeg, MD, MPH and colleagues, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, coauthored an article outlining the research that has been done to identify the risks and challenges involved in human commercial spaceflight. The authors describe the development of wearable biomedical monitoring equipment for spaceflight participants and of a medical and physiological database. In addition, the suthors also discuss topics such as the risk of electromagnetic interference and ionizing radiation to implanted medical devices in the article "The Human Challenges of Commercial Spaceflight: An Overview of Medical Research Conducted by the University of Texas Medical Branch Through the Federal Aviation Administration Center of Excellence."

"One of the most important areas of New Space research is to determine whether there are biomedical conditions that would disqualify ordinary citizens from a short ride to the edge of space. This first rigorous, peer-reviewed work on a broad range of volunteers indicates most people can take that brief trip," concludes Editor-in-Chief of New Space Prof. Scott Hubbard, Stanford University, in the Editorial "Space Biomedicine -- Who Can Travel to the Final Frontier?"

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About the Journal

New Space facilitates and supports the efforts of researchers, engineers, analysts, investors, business leaders, and policymakers to capitalize on the opportunities of commercial space ventures. Spanning a broad array of topics including technological advancements, global policies, and innovative applications, the journal brings the new space community together to address the challenges and discover new breakthroughs and trends in this epoch of private and public/private space discovery. The Journal is published quarterly online with Open Access options and in print. Complete table of contents are available on the New Space website.

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Is space tourism safe or do civilians risk health effects?