importance of research in space

NASA's former chief scientist on why space exploration is vital to humanity

Ellen Stofan, Former NASA Chief Scientist, on why space exploration is vital to humanity

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Stay up to date:.

• Humans are about to return to the Moon, and are working on a mission to Mars.
• Former NASA chief scientist Ellen Stofan and current undersecretary for science and research at the Smithsonian explains why space exploration is so important for humanity.
• And why it can help us protect our 'pale blue dot' of a planet.

Ellen Stofan is undersecretary for science and research at the Smithsonian and former chief scientist at NASA, where she helped guide the development of a long range plan to get humans to Mars.

In conversation with the World Economic Forum's Nikolai Khlystov, who leads the Forum's work on space, Stofan explained why we should go to Mars, what other parts of the solar system we should be exploring more closely, and how the James Webb Space Telescope is effectively a time machine looking back close to the very start of the universe.

It's a fascinating discussion that digs deep into what life in space would truly look like and how exploration can help us tackle challenges here on earth. Whether you are a space nerd or know next to nothing about space, Ellen talks 'human' about what often seems a subject restricted to the experts. A transcript, edited for clarity, is below.

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Nikolai Khlystov: So Ellen, the 1960s and the seventies were a really exciting time for space. Humanity got to space in the first place. We went to the Moon. We sent spacecraft all over the solar system. And since then we've been living in the lower earth orbit continuously for the last 20-plus years on the International Space Station. We were able to do all these missions in the earlier decades without really having the computational power as we know it today. Now, the excitement from that era somewhat diminished over the years, but of course, now things are changing, lots is happening.

Can you tell me a little bit about what are your favourite missions from this year, 2022, and what are you most excited perhaps for the next one or two years?

Ellen Stofan: When you think back to the Apollo era, it was really incredible what they were able to accomplish. In the US, it actually took over 400,000 people working to make Apollo happen. And when you think of the challenge at that time, you know, it was actually really incredible, because we barely had computers, we didn't know what a spacesuit was, we didn't know how to do a spacewalk, we didn't know how to keep astronauts alive in space, full stop. And so where we were technologically and what we had to accomplish in that nine years it took from President Kennedy's challenge to get to the Moon all the way to landing on the Moon in the summer of 1969 was absolutely incredible.

And, of course, to me, again, one of the most exciting parts, since I'm a geologist, was the fact that we learned an incredible amount from Apollo, not just was it a huge technological development, it really moved forward our understanding that, for example, the Moon used to be part of the Earth. And so this incredible knowledge that was gained scientifically as well as this just amazing technological accomplishment. And I think winding through our conversation today, I also want to harp on this inspirational piece that I think is especially valuable today. When there's so much going on that, frankly, it seems really daunting to people in the public, like can humanity really overcome the challenges in front of us? So whether it's climate change, whether it's dealing with global pandemics, you know, Apollo showed that when humanity puts its mind to doing something — again, remember that eight years and what we had to accomplish — I think Apollo is something, you know, people talk about moonshots. The moonshot was a moonshot. You know, let's think back to what that word means and use it really carefully. But let's use that for inspiration. And I can't tell you how many people I've met who run companies around the world — why they did it? They did it because they were inspired by Apollo. And I think that piece, that inspiration piece, is really important.

I think one of the best-kept secrets we have in STEM, is we get to have all the fun. We get to ask, how does the world work? And we go figure it out.

Nikolai Khlystov: Apollo was absolutely incredible. And of course, there were other missions from other countries that they were doing research there. And the Soviet Union had robotic missions there, of course, as well. But now we're back to the Moon. We're supposed to be going back there with humans in the next three or four years. We've not been there for over 50 years. Are you excited about that?

Back to the Moon, five decades later

Ellen Stofan: I'm incredibly excited. I actually have been down to Florida twice last month trying to watch that first launch of the SLS [Space Launch System] for Artemis-1. You know, getting back to the Moon, when you say, well, we did this 50 years ago, what's the big deal? Well, we actually have to go and figure out an awful lot over again. First of all, we had to build a really big rocket and the Space Launch System is a huge rocket. I was actually really impressed. I've seen a lot of rocket launches in my life, but when I went down for the first and second launch attempts for the space launch system, an Artemis-1, I was really blown away by how big that rocket is. And so when that actually launches and right now it's scheduled to go on November 14th, it's going to be incredible because the force, you know, the shockwave, when that hits you, when that thing goes off the ground, is going to be incredibly exciting.

I think to me, this return to the Moon is is so important. We've been in low-Earth orbit for over 20 years, as you said. We've learned incredible things from the International Space Station. We've learned how to live in space. And some people might say, really? Is that is that really a big deal? It is a hugely big deal. If you think of it from how do we feed people over longer periods of time, really mundane things like can we get a toilet that works consistently and doesn't break? You don't want to go to Mars, you know, eight months to Mars, eight months back. You don't want to do that with a broken toilet. Life support systems — how do we keep the air clean? The carbon dioxide levels at an acceptable rate for astronaut health? How do we protect them from solar flares? These are all things we've been learning on the International Space Station, how to keep astronauts healthy in space for long durations, how to live in space. This is a really big deal.

So now we're ready to take that next step. We're ready to go back to the room and say, all right, now we practise getting farther from the Earth. And again, why is that a big deal? Right now, we're incredibly dependent on mission control. You think of this, Houston, we have a problem, right? Ground control is always right there. The time delay is low. The astronauts can get back quickly and easily if there's ever a problem. When you're going to the Moon that's over a three-day trip, it's really far away. It looks close when you see it up in the sky. But boy, the Moon is far. And so doing that can we break this tie from Earth? Get up to the Moon. Practise that kind of remote living from Earth. And then be ready to go on to Mars. So this next step to me is incredibly important. It's incredibly exciting because I'm more of a humans to Mars person. And so we need to do this to get to Mars, and we're right on the brink of actually seeing it happen.

Nikolai Khlystov: Hold that thought, Ellen, for Mars. We'll definitely get to that. And some of those challenges multiply exponentially when we talk about Mars, of course. And by the way, of course, I think I don't know if you mentioned the water filtration systems, right. We've learned a lot from the previous decades, right. And we're using that technology for some filtration on earth as well.

Ellen Stofan: Yeah, that's true. And so when you think about it, you know, water's really heavy. And one of the difficulties with human space exploration, with exploration writ large, it's really hard to get off the Earth. We're a big, we have a lot of gravity. And so the biggest cost of exploration is actually getting things from the ground to space because you have to overcome Earth's gravity to get out there. And this leads to the importance of the rise of the commercial launch industry, which is another whole topic. That's why that's so important. They're trying to bring down the cost of getting off the Earth. Water is really heavy. And so if you're launching water up into space for the astronauts to drink, that's just like a lot of money. So why not reuse water? So on the space station right now, I think they're up in the high 80% if not low 90%, of reusing water. Yes. That means they purify urine and drink it. You know, it's been a taxable problem, but it has some difficulties. When you purify the water, it leaves a brine behind. That's kind of messy. And so trying to get that system to work and have it work well has been a learning process. But we'd love to get up to the mid-90% of water reuse. That means we have to bring less water along. Water's also really important as a possible shield from cosmic radiation, which are high energy cosmic rays that come from deep space, they can do a lot of damage to the human body. It turns out water is a great shield.

Nikolai Khlystov: What do you think we're going to be doing as humans on the Moon? What are some the possibilities? We'll get there in three or four years. Maybe we'll come back. We won't stay right away. But by the early 2030s, late 2030s, are we going to have a permanent presence, maybe a small moon village? I mean, there are some plans for that internationally as well.

Ellen Stofan: I think it's a super interesting concept. And so do you have other governments, do you have the commercial, the private sector wanting to build things on the Moon, being able to, you know, are we going to get- like right now we're looking at private citizens going up to low-Earth orbit. Are we going to get private citizens going to the Moon? Are we going to have this hotel on the Moon? Is there a commercial there? Is there a profit motive? Companies don't do things unless they think I can potentially make a profit on this or I can definitely make a profit on it.

So I think as we go forward, it'll be really interesting to see where the governments want to put their investments and NASA's basic role, is that exploration piece, not the business development piece. Now they want to support the business development and get it moving, but then they want to move on and do the things that are more deep space exploration. So I'll be really curious to see how the next 10 to 15 years develops, how much government infrastructure do we want to invest on the Moon, and how much does the private sector really come in and fill behind NASA like they're doing right now in low-Earth orbit and certainly on the middle earth orbit and higher orbit where you see a lot of private investment. And so this balance between government investment, private sector investment, how that leads to the development of the Moon and then as NASA goes on to Mars, I think it's going to be super interesting.

Next stop: Mars

Nikolai Khlystov: Let's go to Mars, of course, much further away. Can you maybe share a little bit some of the difficulties you alluded to some of them already when we're talking about the Moon, cosmic radiation. But it's just the distance, it's the communication. What are some of the other challenges for us to actually not just go perhaps to the Martian orbit, but actually to land there?

Ellen Stofan: Mars is a whole lot. And so some people look at that and say, oh, it's too hard, we can't do it. And I again go back let's go back to Apollo. You know, we didn't know how to make a spacesuit. We didn't even know how to keep astronauts alive.

First of all, it's a long way there. It's about eight months to a year transit time to get there. You're going to stay for at least a couple of months and then you've got a transit time back of about eight months to a year. So we're talking probably minimum 2 to 3 year mission. That's a long time difference. You're going to be in zero gravity. You're going to be in low Mars gravity. That's hard on the human body. So we're still doing work to make sure we understand how to get humans ready for that. Practising on the Moon will be important for that. Landing on Mars is really complicated, and you see the kind of really complex systems that NASA used to land the Perseverance Rover. The amount of mass we need to land on the surface is about five times. To land these really big rovers on Mars is really complicated, really big amount of mass. Unlike the Moon, Mars has an atmosphere, but it actually helps the spacecraft heat up, but doesn't really slow you down because it's a very, very thin atmosphere. Mars is a much more kind of familiar place to us because it's a planet with an atmosphere. But landing on that surface is just really tough. You need something called supersonic retro propulsion, which is something that Elon Musk and SpaceX have worked on. Again, you're going to heat up that craft coming in and you have to slow it down really rapidly. Huge technological challenge.

Then there's that one-way light time to Mars. It takes about 20 minutes to get a signal to Mars from the Earth. That's just distance and speed of light. And so if you said, Houston, we have a problem, it's going to be 40 minutes to an hour before you hear back. So what does that say? We need computing, we need Artificial Intelligence. We need assistance for the astronauts because frankly, after eight months in space, your reaction times have slowed. And so you're going to need computing support to help you make decisions. Those are just a few of the technological challenges, let alone living on the surface of Mars, growing food, which we're practising, on the surface of Mars. So incredible technologies. They're learning to use Mars, pulling oxygen out of the Mars atmosphere, for potentially rocket fuel or using Mars water to manufacture rocket fuel on the surface. So you can make things on the surface of Mars and bring less with you. We call that in-situ resource utilisation. That's a big technological challenge that we're also going to do some practising on the Moon for.

Nikolai Khlystov: What are some of the reasons beyond the science, in your view, for us to actually go there in person? You've you've mentioned that it feels a little bit more like our own home planet. What does that mean for us as humans if we actually step foot on Mars and maybe a little bit later on, they actually decide to stay there?

Ellen Stofan: You know, I just think it's this incredible inspiration. And I do want to make it clear, you know, sometimes you read in the press issues around people saying, well, if the Earth gets really bad, we'll go live on Mars. No, Mars is really tough. It's irradiated by cosmic radiation and solar radiation because it doesn't have a magnetic field that protects you from space radiation like the Earth does. There's chemicals in the soil that are toxic to humans. Mars is really tough and we certainly need a scientific base there with humans, but we're not going to move large-scale numbers of humans to Mars, it's just a step too far.

I'm really looking forward to the day when we have bases of humans on Mars doing science, looking for evidence of past life. And I do think, again, if you look back to Apollo, look what humanity can achieve when we put our minds to it. And what I love about this journey, Mars, is it's very unlike the journey to the Moon that Apollo did, because all of a sudden you're not going to have just one space agency leading it, you're having space agencies from all around the world cooperating to get to Mars. You have people that look like all of us who are going to be the crews that go, not just two or three white men, and you're going to have real international cooperation and also public-private partnerships that I think make this very different, very exciting, very inspirational. And I think that idea of having all of us go to the Moon or to Mars together is really going to inspire the next generation of technologists, of people who help us make this planet more sustainable.

The search for life

Nikolai Khlystov: Well, we've spoken a little bit about humans going to the Moon, humans going to Mars. I mean, there are lots of other missions that are taking place right now which are being planned for as well, pushing the horizon a little bit on the distance in our solar system. So off to Mars, we have a few more planets. There is one particular planet which is very interesting: Saturn, and it has some interesting moons, of course. And you know, one of those moons very well, Titan. Can you tell us a little bit about Titan, why you know it and what's being planned for Titan in the coming years?

Ellen Stofan: Yeah. So I worked on the Cassini mission to Titan, which was really amazing. And right now I'm a co-investigator on a mission called Dragonfly . It's going to launch in the late 2020s, around 2027. It'll get to Titan in the early 2030s and it is an octocopter. So it's basically a drone that's going to land in the equatorial, so near the equator on Titan and fly around the equatorial region. Landing, going back up, landing again, sampling the surface, understanding what it's made of.

So why is this interesting? Titan is the only satellite in the solar system that has a substantial atmosphere. Its atmosphere is mostly nitrogen, like ours. It's also the only other body besides Earth in the solar system where you have large bodies of liquid, you have rivers that flow down into those seas. So you have these incredible earth-like processes going on on the surface, which help us understand the Earth better, which is why we explore the planets. But it's also, to me, just kind of magical in a way. I spent five years working on a proposal to send a boat to one of those seas on Titan that didn't go forward. But we've got Dragonfly, which I'm really excited about now.

When you go out looking for life beyond Earth, you really have to wonder, what is it exactly that I'm looking for?

Why should we care about rivers and seas on Titan? And wait a minute, Saturn, how does that work? It is very cold out in the outer solar system. In fact, it's about 90 degrees kelvin on the surface of Titan. That's not water, right, at those temperatures. The rocks on Titan are actually made of water ice. That fluid that's raining down from the sky, forming the rivers and seas is actually liquid methane and liquid ethane. Basically liquid gasoline, that's what's the fluid out with those temperatures in the outer solar system. It's really interesting to say how does a river work? How do waves form on an ocean in different gravity, different fluid? We can learn more about the fundamental behaviour of how river and ocean systems work, how they exchange gas with the atmosphere and how the climate of Titan is affected over time. So super interesting on many, many scientific levels.

The other thing that's super intriguing is we've really thought a lot about life in the solar system. Right now we have one data point that's the Earth. And so we know life formed here on Earth fairly rapidly. After the Earth formed, all the planets formed about four and a half billion years ago. By 3.9 billion years ago, the conditions here on the planet had stabilised. Life evolved almost right away, simple single-celled life forms in the oceans. So we think you definitely need water. The organic molecules were actually delivered by asteroids and comets. You see amino acids in both of those, we see amino acids in interstellar clouds. You had this combination of energy, water and organic compounds, and you've got the evolution of life. When you go to Titan, you have those same organic materials — methane and ethane are organic fluids — you've got sources of energy, we know there's volcanoes on Titan, we know it rainstorms on Titan. But remember, you don't have water. So how important is water to the evolution of life? We don't know the answer to that. So Titan is a super interesting place to go to really understand what are the limits of life? Could we have weird Titan life? We don't know. We're going to go find out. And this question of life in the solar system in the universe is so important.

Nikolai Khlystov: Well, let's let's maybe talk a little bit about that and let's talk about another huge mission, huge scientific mission: the James Webb Space telescope. Share a few details, a lot of folks may have heard about it, but some maybe have not. Another telescope which has given us amazing amount of wealth of knowledge over the last couple of decades, of course, the Hubble. Maybe mention a little bit what is the difference between Hubble and the James Webb, and maybe share a few things about James Webb. Has it uncovered anything dramatically new? It's been active for just a number of months, I think, right? Do we know something that we didn't know before it went up?

Ellen Stofan: Hubble was such an amazing telescope. You know, it's still operating now. I don't even know I'm going to get the date wrong. It's like 28 years or something like that. So it's operated way beyond its lifetime, partially because it got repaired by astronauts many times. It's in a lower orbit than James Webb is, and Hubble literally rewrote what we know about the universe. So James Webb was the follow-on telescope to Hubble. They're called the Great Observatory. We have other great observatories. The difference between Hubble is it primarily looks in the visible range of light.

If you think of the electromagnetic spectrum, all those different bands of energy give you different information. It's like putting on different kinds of glasses and being able to see different aspects of the universe and how it works because processes out there are really energetic. So you're going to learn something by looking in the x-ray like the Chandra Observatory does. You're going to learn by looking in the visible the way Hubble does. The exciting thing about James Webb is it's looking in the infra-red. So that's giving you just different information, very complementary, to what we've learned from other great observatories that are up there.

The other really big and new thing about Webb is you need a really big mirror because what you're trying to do is collect light from very far away, and the James Webb Mirror is much bigger than any mirror we have ever put before in space. And in fact, it's so big that it couldn't be put into a rocket fairing — that pointy bit at the top of the rocket — without being folded up. And now you think: that's crazy, how do you fold a mirror? Not something you would normally do, right? So this is an incredibly complicated, advanced technology mirror that was folded up, launched by the European Space Agency, Ariane rocket, and put out to a place called L2, which is the second Lagrange Point, which is basically a stable orbit. So you don't have to boost it. Once you put it there, it's in good shape. Then we had to spend about a month deploying Webb. It had some incredible number of single-point failures. If any one thing went wrong, it was not going to be successful. We had to unfold all the mirrors. We had to expand this big sunshade that blocks light so that Webb can look very deep into the universe, collect that light it needs to collect. And I was so frightened.

You know, it's one of those things I worked on Webb a little bit when I was at NASA. And, you know, the hearts and souls of the engineers and the scientists go into these missions. And I knew the science that was going to come out of Webb. It was going to be like Hubble all over again, right? It's going to be rewriting textbooks for years to come. And so when it left the Earth, it was so emotional to see that spacecraft moving away from the Earth, going through the deployment. That I can tell you every time the test images came back during that phase in the spring, it was just so incredibly exciting to see it working. The deployment went basically flawlessly and the images that are coming back: you asked, are they amazing? You know, we've been in just basically test phases. We've detected carbon dioxide planets around other stars. Imaging came out where it was reimaging something called the Pillars of Creation. It's out in the star field where we're seeing a zone where planets are forming really complimentary to Hubble, really allowing us to see these planet nurseries. How do they operate? What kind of energy processes are going on? The combination of the visible light from Hubble and the Infra-Red from James Webb are really giving us new ideas about how those zones operate. Again, these images are weeks old, so this is all like still blowing our minds.

The image that was shown there with the telescope before it was launched was its first deep-field image. Hubble had a deep field image. And what you do is you look at the darkest part of the night sky and you just leave the telescope there and you collect light. So that light is coming from very far away. This always gets people super confused because the light is coming from far away, you're basically looking back in time because that light started out a very long time ago and has now finally reached the telescope. Hubble was able to look back around 100 or so million years from the Big Bang. Basically, James Webb in this first image was able to look — it didn't even look for that long — was able to look within about 40 million years of the Big Bang. It's going to get back within a few tens of millions of years. The Big Bang, we have huge questions. What did that very early time period in the history of the universe look like? Hubble had been able to show us that very early in the solar system you had a lot of galaxies forming. If you look at this new image from James Webb of that same region, the number of galaxies has gone up exponentially. So much material, so much organization of material into galaxies already. Fascinating what this is going to tell us about how the Big Bang worked, those early tens of millions of years, which I know to most people seems like a lot of time, but it's really not in the history of our 13 billion-year-old universe, how did the universe form? And we need to know those early time periods to understand that. And you can tell I'm just getting like so excited I can't even speak. These images to me are literally mind-blowing and I'm so excited about it. This telescope is, again, going to be rewriting textbooks as we go.

Nikolai Khlystov: Well, and you're giving me goosebumps just when you started talking about the James Webb, let's maybe talk a little bit about the aspect of search for life. I mean, you've spoken about James Webb looking for the carbon signatures. Maybe you can talk a little bit about how a telescope looks for signatures of life. And I'd love to ask you another question, which perhaps becomes a little bit more philosophical, but how do we know potentially there is life hundreds or thousands of light years away?

Ellen Stofan: This is such a great question because if you again, go back to that story of how life emerged on earth, water, organic molecules, sorts of energy, again, source of energy and the organic molecules, that part we think is pretty easy. It's the conditions on a planet where water can be stable on the surface or maybe some other working fluid, depending on what we find on Titan. And then those conditions have to persist because if you look at a place like Mars, Mars had the exact same conditions as Earth at around the same time in the solar system. But those conditions only persisted for about a billion years. And here we are on Earth, three and a half billion years. You know, we're chugging along right, ish. We'll come back to that later. But what we've had certainly ups and downs, you know, massive asteroid impacts, you know, minor things like that here on Earth that have endangered the long-term existence of life. The conditions were stable enough on this planet that not only allowed life to evolve, but allowed it to thrive, allowed it to become more complex all the way from single-celled organisms to us. That's tough, right, to have that long-term stability on a planet.

So as we go outward in our own solar system, we look at Mars and say, well, wow, that's the most likely place, because we know a billion years wow on Earth life was still in the ocean after a billion years, still just single celled, multicellular, lifeforms. But life could have evolved. That's plenty of time on Mars. And so that's what we're doing on Mars. We're really looking for this question of, wow, is this the second data point where we can say, all right, those conditions, again, really easy on Earth, if Mars had the same conditions, why wouldn't life have evolved there also? If it didn't, that would actually be scientifically surprising.

Then we look out at places like the moons of Jupiter and Saturn that have water under their surface Europa, Jupiter, Enceladus of Saturn. Water oceans under an ice crust. Water. Oceans. Oceans, right, sound familiar again? Right now, there's lots of missions going on. We're going to go back to Europa and look at that body. There's a lot of missions that have been proposed looking at going back to Enceladus, this moon of Saturn. We've got Dragonfly going to Titan to look at what are the limits of life. Because if we can demonstrate that life originated in more than one body in our own solar system, it makes us much more optimistic about finding life beyond Earth. And it also widens what we're looking for, right? Because right now we think of life as life as we know it. And believe it or not, people who turned this into two acronyms: life as we know it and life as we don't know it. Because now think of Titan and now think of every science crazy science fiction movie you've ever seen, or especially, you know, Star Trek with all kinds of different life forms. Why couldn't that have happened? And so when you go out looking for life beyond Earth, you really have to wonder, what is it exactly that I'm looking for?

You know, we have very definitive ideas of life here on Earth. It has metabolism, it has reproduction. It has ability to move. So we have RNA. We have DNA. So is that what we're looking for? So we have this whole list. Actually, NASA has this great site on astrobiology where we have this logic flow of what we think of life. So now if we go beyond Earth right now, what we're looking for is sort of Earth 2.0. So when we're looking at planets around other stars, we're looking for places that have water stable on the surface. We're looking for gases in the atmosphere that here on Earth are associated with life, carbon dioxide, methane, jumping all the way back to the detection of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere around the planet, around another star that James Webb detected. Finding CO2 in an atmosphere isn't proof that there's life on that planet. You can produce carbon dioxide in lots of different ways, but finding it is super interesting and makes you think, alright, now I want to look more.

Ultimately we want to detect methane, we want to detect elemental oxygen and then what we would really like to find is what we call disequilibrium. We want to find gases that are out of their chemical balance, which would tell us there's some process going on. Something is eating something and giving something off. That's metabolism. You know, if you were looking at Earth from another star, you'd actually be able to see the Earth going through seasons because it gives off big amounts of carbon dioxide and then all of a sudden it drops again. So you can see there's some sort of active process going on. That's what will be looking on as we move forward with these big telescopes. Ultimately, we want to image planets around other stars, and for that we'd be really looking for things like colour changes. Again, it's autumn here in the northern hemisphere. You've got beautiful colour out my window, so you can actually see the colour of the Earth change as we move through seasons. Those are the kinds of things we'll ultimately be looking for. But for that, we need a way bigger telescope even than James Webb, one that we'll probably have to build in space.

Nikolai Khlystov: Maybe last question on the life topic, do you think there's a difference if we were to find signs of life, say, on Mars or in Titan versus finding some kind of life signature hundreds of light years away in another star system?

Ellen Stofan: I think so, because frankly, when we find life in our own solar system, it's either going to be evidence of past life or frankly, it's going to be in this kind of single-celled multi-cell, which is crazy exciting for scientists. Does it have RNA? Does it have DNA? Those are questions I think will be profound no matter what. But I think as we move outward, looking beyond our own solar system, what we're really hoping for is could we find somewhere where there was complex life? We just lost Frank Drake recently. He was a wonderful scientist who came up with something called the Drake Equation. He tried to put into mathematical terms what's the likelihood of finding complex life, i.e. intelligent life, more or less intelligent life like us, on planets around other stars? And I think that's really tough. And we know we're not going to do it in this solar system. So as we go outward and find more and more planets, we get closer and closer to potentially finding intelligent life, which is, I think, kind of the holy grail for what humanity is curious about.

Intercepting an asteroid

Nikolai Khlystov: Absolutely incredible. Well, there is one more mission that was just was in the news a couple of weeks ago. And that's maybe another way to bring us sort of slowly start to bring us back to Earth. It's DART [Double Asteroid Redirection Test]. So this was a relatively small mission, but with potentially huge impacts. Can you tell us a little bit more about it?

Ellen Stofan: It did have a huge impact. In fact, there was a news story this morning about how the Hubble Space Telescope is still seeing it was able to image actually the debris trail from Didymos, the satellite. So Dart was the first time we've actually really tested can we protect the Earth when an asteroid we detect that an asteroid is headed towards Earth. The history of the planets in our solar system is a history of impact. Now, they occurred really frequently in the very early history of the solar system. You can see that just by going outside at night and looking at the Moon, of all those craters on the Moon, most of them were formed during a period we called the heavy bombardment, which is about the first 502 billion years of solar system history. After that, there was much less material around because it got incorporated into planets, got cleaned out of the inner solar system, but things still happen. You had the Chelyabinsk incident, you had Tunguska, where we had basically moderate-sized rocks coming into Earth's atmosphere, knocking down trees, breaking windows. All right, just think if something like that happened in New York City. Just think of the rock were a lot bigger. Just think if it was really big and we were looking at something, the scale of what happened at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary where a lot of life on Earth was actually wiped out.

So, we need to be able to protect ourselves from incoming asteroids. And DART was actually a test of this. We went and slammed something into an asteroid. And you can say, well, that's just physics. Certainly, we understand, you know, you hit one body with another, what's going to happen? The problem is asteroids are messy. Some of them are made of metal. So they're really dense and really you would hit it and it might not go very far. A lot of them, though, actually a huge majority that we've been able to understand, are actually piles of rubble. This is the case with the one we hit. And so you saw this just huge amount of debris that came out, again, detectable by Hubble. So, fascinating mission — really fun.

And again, the reason we do so much in space is thinking back to this planet, which as Carl Sagan very eloquently said in his pale blue dot speech, which I always urge people to go look at, you know, the Earth is where we make our stand. Of all places we've seen, of all the places we've studied, and again, he says it much more eloquently than I am, this is the only place we've found where humans can actually live and thrive.

The history of the planets in our solar system is a history of impact ... you can see that just by going outside at night and looking at the Moon of all those craters on the Moon.

Bringing the research back down to Earth

Nikolai Khlystov: You, as a planetary scientist, of course, refer to this, right? You studied Venus, you've studied Titan in detail. And you know what can happen if greenhouse gases take over. Could you share a little bit about what you have seen from from some of the other places in the solar system as examples? How do how do we related back to our planet, particularly now?

Ellen Stofan: I study planetary surfaces, so I look at things like volcanoes. And what we're trying to do is use other planets to help understand the Earth. Like if you are a doctor and you only have one patient, that's how it is. You're hampered when you're only studying one planet. So through comparative planetology, we can look at things like how do volcanoes erupt under different conditions, different gravity, different rock types across the solar system? Well, think of that with weather and climate. So when we look at Venus, when we look at Mars, when we look at Titan, we have planets with different climates, different gases in their atmosphere. One thing we have learned, if we've learned nothing else. Greenhouse gases warm a planet's surface. We understand that and a lot of the times when I talk to climate deniers, it's like, look, I've got Mars, I got Venus. I can tell you we understand how greenhouse gases behave. If we put all that oil, gas and coal into the Earth's atmosphere, this planet would become flat-out uninhabitable. That can't happen.

I've got Mars, I got Venus. I can tell you we understand how greenhouse gases behave. If we put all that oil, gas and coal into the Earth's atmosphere, this planet would become flat-out uninhabitable. That can't happen.

So we have the technology, we have the knowledge to be able to move beyond where we are now, which is a bad place with human-induced climate change. And the planets have helped us inform how to understand how to model planetary atmospheres, and we understand this planet's atmosphere well enough. Part of that, again, has been through space data. NASA has over 20 satellites and instruments looking at this planet. So does the European Space Agency. All of the space agencies of the world really work really closely together on Earth observations. How do we use space data for Earth to understand this planet, to model what's going to happen to it in the future, and to understand how to use those data for humanity to make sure we can feed this planet, to make sure we have water and these space data really help us move forward on that.

Nikolai Khlystov: So we spoke a little bit about exploration. And so one of the questions I have coming in is what sort of support is needed for the upcoming exploration missions from other sectors, other industries?

Ellen Stofan: You know, I think if you name an industry, there's a way that they need to support space exploration and even more important, planetary sustainability, because when you think about it, if you're going to be on a three-year mission to Mars or a long time duration on the Moon, you need a clean atmosphere, you need healthy food, you need stable pharmaceuticals that don't require refrigeration and are stable for long periods of time. You need to use the least amount of goods possible. I'm thinking of things like clothes. Wouldn't it be great — wear an outfit, you put it through a feed or you print out a new outfit to wear. Rather than having to bring three outfits with you, you bring one and constantly and recombobulate it. That's beyond my- I'm a geologist. And so this idea of living sustainably, living in a circular way rather than in a linear economy the way they do now, all of this is what you need to live on the Moon or Mars. And frankly, this is what we need to do to live on this planet sustainably. So I think there's not an industry out there that doesn't need to think of this idea of Spaceship Earth and that benefits spaceship to moon, spaceship to Mars.

Nikolai Khlystov: Ellen, one more question from the audience. In your opinion, when will we get to Mars with humans?

Ellen Stofan: You know, we could get to Mars with humans in five to 10 years easily. Again, remember that eight to nine years that it took us from Apollo when we knew nothing? It's a question of will and it's a question of resources. And so if the governments of the world decided this was important, we could be there in five to 10 years. If they decide it's not important, we'll get there in, my guess is, 20 to 40 years. That's a huge range, and I think it's really going to depend on the will to actually do this. And I think the other wild card in here is the private sector. I mean, you do have private companies like SpaceX saying we're going to go to Mars, whether the governments want to go or not. And so I think that's a wildcard factor. Does that get us there in more like that ten-year timeframe? So it's going to be interesting.

Nikolai Khlystov: A follow on to that in terms of international collaboration. We have obviously several international missions for the Moon. Artemis being one of them. We have several nations that have made it to Mars. How critical will international collaboration be for getting to Mars?

Ellen Stofan: International collaboration to me is key to absolutely everything and to me it's been a deep part of my career. There hasn't been a planetary mission I've worked on that has not been done internationally. I did my Ph.D. thesis on the Soviet data of Venus and worked very closely with scientists from the Soviet Union. So this is just to me, this is the way we operate and it's the best way. The smartest people are located all over the world. And you want Team Earth getting things done, not a team from one country, because you're going to get there faster and you're going to get there better if you go together.

I think the other issue is this is really expensive, right? And I would argue probably no one country has the ability to do this on their own. And so as we go together, we spread out the cost of it. But again, when a government puts its money into doing something really tough like going to Mars, you're investing in your economy, you're investing in technology, you move your economy forward. So, his isn't a i'm throwing this money away, which a lot of people I often get the question, you know, why aren't we spending money for Earth rather than for space? You spend money for space on Earth, and it's an investment in technology and moving us forward. And as I said, it's also helping us move forward on this idea of planetary sustainability.

Nikolai Khlystov: Let's come back to one of the earlier points of motivation, of generating this excitement, in the space sector, particularly, we're almost lacking talent. We're lacking folks coming out of different universities with the right skills. How important is it to motivate the younger generation on the different maths and sciences and other subjects that are required to go into this field and develop these rockets and develop these landing mechanisms and telescopes. How do we do a better job, perhaps, at communicating this?

Ellen Stofan: Well, you know, this is an incredible focus of ours at the Smithsonian, because to me, it's about great storytelling. You've got to inspire people. Not to be mean to teachers — my mom was a teacher, my grandfather was a teacher — but if you say, all right, we're memorising the formula of the quadratic formula, you're like, why? Am I ever going to use this? What good does it do? And at the Smithsonian, I think we do a really good job of trying to say, look at the amazing things that we do in science, whether it's exploring the planets, understanding how the Sun works. You can be a part of understanding these fundamental whys. Are we alone? How does our planet work? How does the universe work? And it's about storytelling to engage kids.

The other thing we've really been focused on, and I urge people where we've reopened half of the renovated Air and Space Museum on the National Mall, and I think you're going to see a really different Air and Space Museum than maybe the one that you went to 20 years ago. Because what you're going to see are stories about people who look like all of us, whether it's the African-Americans who helped with the Apollo programme, people like the hidden figures. We have Jackie Cochran's plane, not just Chuck Yeager plane, that she was the first woman to break the speed of sound.

If we tell stories about people who look like all of us, we're inspiring kids to say, I can do that. I can go figure this out. You know, I think one of the best-kept secrets we have in STEM, we get to have all the fun. We get to ask, how does the world work? And we go figure it out.

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The Planetary Society • Aug 30, 2021

Why space exploration is always worthwhile

Your guide to advocating for space in a complicated world.

Most people who love space and believe in exploration have probably heard this once or twice: “We shouldn’t waste money on space exploration when there are problems to deal with here on Earth.”

While public health concerns, social injustices, climate change, and other urgent issues are important to address, solving these problems doesn’t depend on defunding space programs.

This can be a difficult conversation to navigate, so we’ve outlined a few ideas here that you can share when advocating for space.

Space research isn’t as expensive as people think

Many countries around the world invest in space science and exploration as a balanced part of their total federal budget. Public opinion research has shown that people estimate NASA to take up as much as a quarter of the U.S. federal budget, but in fact,  NASA’s budget only represents about 0.5% of the total federal budget and the proportion is even smaller for other spacefaring nations . The correct information may go a long way to reassuring critics that space spending isn’t eating up as many public resources as they think.

The United States government spent approximately $6.6 trillion in fiscal year 2020, of which just 0.3% ($22.6 billion) was provided to NASA. In this chart, shades of blue represent mandatory spending programs; shades of orange are discretionary programs that require annual appropriations by Congress. "Defense and related" includes both the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs. Source: Office of Management and Budget Historical Tables 8.5 and 8.7.

Space spending pays off

If someone is arguing that public funds should be spent on solving the world’s problems, they should know that money spent on NASA positively impacts the U.S. economy . We get the same kind of payoff for space spending in other countries. Spending on space supports highly skilled jobs, fuels technology advancements with practical applications, and creates business opportunities that feed back into the economy. This in turn grows the pool of public money that can be spent on solving the world’s most pressing problems.

Space research directly impacts Earthly problems

When people apply themselves to the challenges of exploring space, they make discoveries that can help the world in other ways too. Studying how we might grow food in orbit or on Mars yields insights into growing food in extreme conditions on Earth , generating knowledge that can help mitigate the impacts of climate change. Medical research conducted on the International Space Station helps us understand the human body in new ways, helping save lives and improve quality of life .

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Studying space helps us understand our own world

Studying the cosmos gives us an important perspective shift. When we learn about what lies beyond Earth, it gives us context for understanding our own planet. Studying the other worlds of our solar system and beyond makes it clear that Earth is a precious oasis for life. When we sent spacecraft to Venus we saw how a runaway greenhouse effect turned the world from a habitable planet to an absolute hellscape. When astronauts travel into space they see just how thin and tenuous Earth’s atmosphere is, appreciating the fragile balance in which we live . A cosmic perspective underscores the importance of protecting our planet’s habitability and encourages investment in that effort.

Studying space may one day save us all

All the social and environmental progress in the world won't help us if an asteroid impacts the Earth. We have to explore space to find and study the asteroids and comets in our cosmic neighborhood if we want to make sure we can  defend our planet  if an object ever heads our way.

Space is inspiring

Not every child who dreams of becoming an astronaut will get that opportunity. This is a sad truth that many of us know from experience. But to be inspired to aim for something so grand gives kids the motivation to study hard and gain skills in science, engineering, medicine, or other fields that benefit humanity and directly help overcome problems that we face as a species.

And inspiration isn’t just for kids. When we marvel at the beauty of Jupiter’s clouds or the mystery of Enceladus’ oceans , we get an opportunity to appreciate the wonder and majesty of this cosmos that we inhabit. The idea that life might exist elsewhere in the universe reminds us that we might not be the only planet struggling to achieve balance, justice, and sustainability. And even in the bleakest of times, there’s something beautiful about still striving to achieve something great and discover something that could change how we see ourselves and our cosmos forever.

There’s plenty of room at the table

There’s no denying that there are many important issues facing humanity that need fixing. But to deal with those problems doesn’t mean we have to stop looking up, stop exploring, and stop making discoveries.

Human civilization has astonishing capacity, and we can do more than one important thing at a time. If someone thinks that a particular issue should get more attention and investment, they can and should advocate for that. The problems we face don’t persist because we’re spending money on space science and exploration. And there’s no reason to pit our aspirations against one another.

Let’s Go Beyond The Horizon

Every success in space exploration is the result of the community of space enthusiasts, like you, who believe it is important. You can help usher in the next great era of space exploration with your gift today.

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NASA Eclipse Science

Eclipses aren’t just beautiful – they’re great for science.

In addition to inspiring artists and musicians, eclipses have driven numerous scientific discoveries. For over a century, solar eclipses helped scientists decipher the Sun’s structure and explosive events , find evidence for the theory of general relativity, and discover a new element , among other things.

Today, NASA scientists still study eclipses to make new discoveries about the Sun, Earth, and our space environment. Total solar eclipses are particularly important because they allow scientists to see a part of the Sun’s atmosphere – known as the corona – that’s too faint to see except when the bright light of the Sun is blocked.

Scientists use instruments called coronagraphs to block the Sun’s light in a manner similar to a total eclipse, but these instruments still struggle to reveal the region of the corona closest to the Sun, where many important processes occur.

Why We Observe Solar Eclipses

Studying the innermost part of the corona – visible only during total solar eclipses – is key to answering fundamental questions about how heat and energy are transferred from the Sun out into the solar wind, the constant stream of particles that the Sun spews into the solar system. The solar wind can impact humans and technology at Earth, so understanding how it becomes accelerated at the Sun can help predict its impacts at home.

Total solar eclipses provide an opportunity to study Earth’s atmosphere under uncommon conditions. In contrast to the global change in light that occurs every day at dusk and dawn, a solar eclipse changes illumination of Earth and its atmosphere under a comparatively small region of the Moon’s shadow. This localized blocking of solar energy is useful for studying the Sun’s effects on our atmosphere, especially the upper atmosphere, where the Sun’s energy creates a layer of charged particles called the ionosphere. Understanding this region is important because it’s home to many low-Earth orbit satellites as well as communications signals, such as radio waves and the signals that make GPS systems work, and changes there can have significant impacts on our technology and communication systems.

Recent Solar Eclipse Science

During the 2017 total solar eclipse, NASA funded 11 scientific studies to collect data only available during eclipses. Since the eclipse had a notably long passage over the contiguous United States, it provided a unique opportunity for scientists to observe the eclipse from the ground over a period of more than an hour. These observations complemented the wealth of data provided by NASA satellites.

Some of the data collected from the 2017 eclipse helped scientists develop models to predict what the corona during the 2019 eclipse over Chile and Argentina would look like. Data from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) was also used for the prediction of the corona during the 2021 eclipse over Antarctica. Such models help scientists predict how solar material travels outward from the Sun, ultimately manifesting as disturbances in near-Earth space, known as space weather.

The 2019 eclipse in South America was also observed by NASA's Global-scale Observation of Limb and Disk – GOLD – mission, which provided the first measurements of how eclipses affect the layer of Earth’s atmosphere called the thermosphere.

Sometimes scientists also undertake longer-term studies of eclipses. In 2021, scientists published findings made with over a decade of eclipse observations . The team found that the corona maintains a fairly constant temperature, despite undergoing changes that occur on an 11-year rotation known as the solar cycle .

More Resources

Day to Night and Back Again: Earth’s Ionosphere During the Total Solar Eclipse

Eclipse 2017 Shines Light on the Sun-Earth Connection

Studying the Sun’s Atmosphere with the Total Solar Eclipse of 2017

Research Highlights from NASA’s GOLD Mission

First Global-Scale Synoptic Imaging of Solar Eclipse Effects in the Thermosphere

Chasing the Total Solar Eclipse from NASA’s WB-57F Jets

Discover More Topics From NASA

2024 Total Eclipse

Types of Solar Eclipses

Eclipses Stories

US participation in space has benefits at home and abroad − reaping them all will require collaboration

Graduate Research Assistant in the Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis, University of Oklahoma

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Cheyenne Black does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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When people think about what we get from the U.S. space program, it may be along the lines of NASA technology spin-offs such as freeze-dried food and emergency space blankets .

But space activities do much more that benefits life on Earth. Research in space helps scientists study our environment, develop new technologies, create jobs, grow the economy and foster international collaboration.

Of course, with reports of Russia developing an anti-satellite nuclear weapon , members of Congress and the media have focused their attention on space defense and military readiness.

This is critical, but there are still many other benefits to reap from space. Getting the most out of U.S. space involvement will require collaborating across various social, environmental, commercial, governmental, international and technological backgrounds.

As a space policy scholar focused on private-public partnerships, networks and coalitions, I’ve seen that policymakers can get the most out of U.S. space endeavors if they invite a wide array of experts into policy discussions.

Benefits on Earth

NASA satellites play a crucial role in documenting changes in global temperatures, sea-level rise, arctic ice extent and air quality . Satellites have also been collecting data for almost 50 years to monitor water use, crop health and crop production . These long-term observations help researchers track environmental changes across the globe.

Space research provides a wide array of technologies in addition to rockets and Moon landers. Cellphone cameras, CAT scanners, the computer mouse, laptops, wireless headsets and water purification systems are just a few public goods NASA has generated.

These spin-off technologies come from NASA’s partnerships with private firms , which subsequently make scientific discoveries widely available and accessible.

Growing the space economy

Experts predict that the space sector will continue driving the development of nonspace industries. Agriculture, energy, mining, transportation and pharmaceuticals are just some of the sectors that benefit through spin-off technologies and space-based research.

For example, scientists can conduct experiments on the International Space Station using the microgravity of space to study the chemistry of drugs, improve medications and test cancer treatments.

More organizations and individuals than ever share a vested interest in the space sector’s success. Experts anticipate the global space economy – the resources used in space for activities – and research and development will continue to grow to a market of US$1.4 trillion by 2030 .

Commercialization policies opened U.S. space activities to the private sector. This has led to partnerships with companies, such as SpaceX, Blue Origin and others, that are growing the space economy.

These companies have increasingly launched rockets and deployed satellites in recent years. This has increased the need for workers, both in manufacturing positions and specialized STEM roles. Additionally, private companies and universities are partnering to develop various technologies, such as landing systems for a U.S. return to the Moon.

Communities that host space industry centers have seen economic and educational benefits. For example, Huntsville, Alabama, home of the Marshall Space Flight Center and the U.S. Space and Rocket Center, has attracted an educated workforce with one of the highest rates of engineers per capita. Almost half of residents over the age of 25 in Huntsville have a bachelor’s degree or higher.

This rate starkly contrasts with the national average, where 37% have at least a bachelor’s degree , and the state’s 27% average . Additionally, Huntsville’s annual median household income is $8,000 higher than the Alabama average .

Since 1982, Huntsville has also hosted over 750,000 students at the U.S. Space and Rocket Center space camp. This camp educates students about science, technology, engineering and leadership to prepare them for a potential future STEM career.

• International collaboration

Space also provides an opportunity for the U.S. to collaborate with other countries.

For example, the U.S. works jointly with Italy to observe the impacts of air quality on human health. The James Webb Space Telescope, a result of partnerships between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency, allows scientists to peer into previously unobserved parts of the cosmos . International collaboration has also established the Artemis Accords , a set of principles agreed to by 40 countries for peaceful, sustainable and transparent cooperation in space.

Getting the most out of space

Right now, U.S. space policymaking occurs at the federal and international level . And while people outside of the government can act as witnesses during congressional hearings or through advocacy groups , that involvement may not be enough to represent the wide spectrum of viewpoints and interests in space policy.

There are a few ways policymakers can receive input from different stakeholders. These might include inviting more experts from various policy areas to provide recommendations in congressional hearings, collaborating with advocacy coalitions to create sustainable policies, strengthening and expanding private-public partnerships, and setting a space agenda that emphasizes research and development.

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The March for Science is appropriately being held this weekend on Earth Day 2017 . The broad theme for the March is “Science is Essential,” and this is applicable also to Earth Day. It may seem that with our growing cities, air conditioning, modern infrastructure, and energy-enabled amenities, we can be more isolated from our environment and less dependent on Earth than our ancestors, but the opposite is true: We are more intimately connected than ever before. Many aspects of modern society depend critically on rich real-time data and sophisticated models about all aspects of our planet and its space environment. Growing populations and development are taxing natural resources and increasingly altering Earth’s land, ecosystems, atmosphere, ice sheets, rivers, and oceans on a global scale. Globalization makes our societies, including the most developed ones, more sensitive to disruptions. These interdependencies make research in the Earth and space sciences critically important for society.

A collection of essays and other recent Special Collections across the American Geophysical Union journals illustrate, celebrate, and illuminate these deep connections. Three broad and generally underappreciated themes emerge across this collection. These themes have important implications in the context of recent U.S. and international political developments.

The first theme is that the notion that “basic” or “curiosity-driven” research is distinct from “applied” research is increasingly an anachronism. Most of the cutting-edge research being conducted by Earth and space scientists has direct relevance to society. This relevance is not new but is more extensive and broadly connected than in the past. Geologic research has long been a key contributor to energy and mineral exploration. But research motivated by curiosity about how the Earth works has also led to important resource discoveries. For example, deep ocean drilling to improve understanding of the ocean crust and sediments in the Gulf of Mexico in the late 1960s led to the discovery of vast oil resources.

Today, the connections are broader. Businesses, societies, and economies operating from local to global scales are critically dependent on real-time data about our planet, increasingly at very fine spatial and temporal scales. In turn, these data feed improved models that both address new research questions and provide operational data and forecasts for societal decisions, from governments to individual farmers and shippers. Examples abound. Detailed real time mapping of ocean currents helps us understand how the oceans mix, directly helping companies save fuel in ocean transportation, trade, fishing, and recreation. Understanding subtle changes in Earth’s rotation tells us about Earth’s core and history but also improves GPS signals on which we increasingly rely. A huge amount of global data of great variety, including from citizen science as well as research into numerical methods and statistics, is necessary to provide ever more accurate weather and water-supply forecasts, yielding major economic benefits, and protecting people, crops, and ecosystems. Observations of the sun and of our near-space environment are used to protect our electrical grids, satellites, and airline passengers as well as to improve the fidelity of GPS signals. Testing of sensors on other planets has improved or led to new satellites that provide key data on Earth. And Earth and space science information provide critical insights for addressing many health concerns, from air pollution to human and agricultural pandemics.

The second theme is that these current capabilities have developed, and are critically dependent on, international collaborations, cooperation, and funding. These collaborations include scientists, of course, but they also involve governments and businesses. Global data for a global economy requires global research and data-collection efforts, which require global collaboration and cost-sharing. In addition, it is clear that understanding of local weather requires rich global data; snowfall in the Sierra Nevada is influenced by dust entrained in the atmosphere from Asia and Africa. Understanding the course of one volcanic eruption or earthquake improves understanding of the next one elsewhere in the world. The costs of research and infrastructure, including satellites, have increasingly been shared worldwide. The U.S. economy, as that of every country, greatly benefits from this global research collaboration and shared financing for Earth observations. These collaborations are needed to maintain and expand our global observing effort and the economic and security benefits that it enables.

The third theme, already introduced, is the inclusion of rich data from monitoring all parts of Earth’s processes and its environments (present and past) into sophisticated models that are used both to understand Earth’s processes and to inform critical societal decisions. This understanding is regularly included in engineering models used to mitigate hazards or design better structures. Likewise, such models provide weather forecasts, help predict water supply and coastal erosion, prepare cities and regions for natural hazards and climate change, and help coordinate responses to disasters in real time. Improvements to these models depend on global data, including data whose collection was originally motivated by scientific research.

Although there has been great progress over several decades in using research in Earth and space science for the benefit of humanity, the collection of essays also highlights many areas where further progress is both possible and needed. These include new applications, constraining uncertainty, and improving models and forecasts. The authors of these essays also discuss how Earth and space scientists can better communicate both what we know and don’t know and where further improvements are within reach. The Earth complex, and the desire for more effective understanding and communication, is strong.

Two critical threats have emerged to the societal benefits provided by Earth and space science. The first is increasing nationalistic tendencies worldwide that threaten the international collaborations that have facilitated the development of global research, funding, and data collection. Our understanding of Earth processes and current global capabilities – and the economic and societal benefits – have developed directly because scientists and students have been allowed to interact internationally, conduct research worldwide, share global observation platforms, secure temporary and permanent positions in other countries, and attend international conferences. Restricting this exchange will directly harm existing capabilities and limit future scientific advances. Because this international cooperation is critical to understanding the Earth as a system, the Earth and space sciences are particularly vulnerable to such restrictions.

The second threat is proposed funding cuts in major science agencies in the United States and elsewhere. These cuts will do the most harm in two critical areas: collecting and interpreting important data, and training and engaging new scientists. The infrastructure supporting scientific data, especially relating to our planet, is fragile and needs new support for long-term preservation and connectivity, as well as broader availability and sharing of data given its critical economic and scientific role. We need better and more systematic data about our impact on the environment, not less. Instead, U.S. agencies are facing the prospect of substantial cuts, spurring efforts to “ save the data .” As Harold Varmus noted in commenting on the proposed cuts to the NIH budget, the cuts are likely to fall most heavily on the youngest aspiring scientists. The proposed cuts send a message that these jobs are not valued, and that the resources needed to support both the long-term collection of data and the training of the next generation of scientists are not guaranteed.

Earth Day and the March for Science both celebrate the increasingly valuable benefit of Earth and space science research for society. It is also an opportunity to appreciate how these impacts are rooted in a very deep understanding of our planet and its past, present, and future environments. This connection between science and society can and should be made even stronger, for even greater benefit to humanity.

—Brooks Hanson, Director Publications, AGU; email: [email protected] ; Jenny Lunn, Assistant Director, Publications, AGU; Ben van der Pluijm , Editor-in-Chief, Earth’s Future;  John Orcutt , Editor-in-Chief , Earth and Space Science;  Rita Colwell , Editor-in-Chief , GeoHealth;  Susan Trumbore , Editor-in-Chief , Global Biogeochemical Cycles;  Thorsten W. Becker , Editor-in-Chief , G-Cubed;  Noah Diffenbaugh , Editor-in-Chief , Geophysical Research Letters;  Robert Pincus , Editor-in-Chief , JAMES;  Mike  Liemohn , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Space Physics;  Uri ten Brink , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Solid Earth;  Peter Brewer , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Oceans;  Minghua Zhang , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Atmospheres;  Steven A. Hauck II , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Planets;  Bryn Hubbard , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Earth Surface;  Miguel Goni , Editor-in-Chief , JGR: Biogeosciences;  Ellen Thomas , Editor-in-Chief , Paleoceanography;  Philip Wilkinson , Editor-in-Chief , Radio Science;  Mark Moldwin , Editor-in-Chief , Reviews of Geophysics;  Delores J. Knipp , Editor-in-Chief , Space Weather;  John Geissman , Editor-in-Chief , Tectonics; and   Martyn Clark , Editor-in-Chief , Water Resources Research

Hanson, B., J. Lunn, B. van der Pluijm, J. Orcutt, R. R. Colwell, S. Trumbore, T. W. Becker, N. Diffenbaugh, R. Pincus, M. Liemohn, U. ten Brink, P. Brewer, M. Zhang, S. A. Hauck II, B. Hubbard, M. Goni, E. Thomas, P. Wilkinson, M. Moldwin, D. J. Knipp, J. Geissman, and M. Clark (2017), Earth and space science for the benefit of humanity, Eos, 98 , https://doi.org/10.1029/2018EO071991 . Published on 20 April 2017.

Text © 2017. The authors. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 Except where otherwise noted, images are subject to copyright. Any reuse without express permission from the copyright owner is prohibited.

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Why do research on the international space station, space station research integration office.

The International Space Station is a modern marvel. Only 400 kilometers (250 miles) above our heads, it streaks spectacularly across the sky at 36,000 kilometers (17,500 miles) per hour, orbiting the Earth every 90 minutes. The station carries an impressive array of research facilities supporting hundreds of experiments at any given time across every major science discipline. It can host up to eight visiting vehicles and accommodate 11 crew—all while providing an amazing view featuring 16 sunrises and sunsets per day. 

But what is so special about an orbiting lab? What makes scientists willing to tackle the significant challenges of planning and scheduling research, designing and building hardware, and committing extraordinary time and effort to complete experiments? 

It’s all about location. 

An orbiting laboratory provides researchers with the unique features of low Earth orbit (LEO): long-duration microgravity, exposure to space, and a unique perspective on our planet. These attributes enable scientists to conduct innovative experiments that cannot be done anywhere else.  

On Earth, everyone and everything experiences the constant pull of Earth’s gravity. Scientists looking to eliminate that force for their experiments use freefall. An object in freefall experiences almost zero net gravitational force (thus the term microgravity) as it drops. While scientists have several ways to generate microgravity conditions on Earth, the event can only last for a short time. An orbiting laboratory is in a permanent state of microgravity as it continuously falls around the Earth in a nearly perfect circle, providing consistent, long-term access to reduced-gravity conditions. 

Sustained microgravity is a game-changer for scientists across many disciplines. For example, humans are uniquely tuned to Earth’s gravity. This force affects our entire body, from how hard our heart pumps to the density of our bones. Plants use gravity to determine which direction their roots should grow. Removing gravity gives biologists unique insights into the responses of all forms of life to new stresses.  

Many physical and chemical processes also change when you remove gravity, opening up opportunities to study boiling, melting, fluid and gas mixing, protein crystallization, and even an ultra-cold state of matter known as Bose-Einstein Condensate in ways not possible on Earth. For example, without gravity hot air does not rise, causing flames to become spherical and behave differently. Surface tension and capillary forces dominate fluid behavior in microgravity, allowing scientists to observe and measure the subtleties of these forces drowned out by gravity on Earth.  

The space station’s orbit differs from sun-synchronous orbits of typical remote-sensing Earth satellites, providing unique observation opportunities for scientists. A lower altitude allows instruments to obtain greater detail, and the station passes over a majority of Earth’s landmass and population centers. The combination of a low-altitude fast orbit, a high orbital angle, and the slow rotation of the Earth underneath produces unique opportunities for observing a variety of locations, atmospheric phenomena, and natural disasters from different angles and with varying lighting conditions.

Having crew on board also generates options not available with typical satellites. Crew members can collect unscheduled data of an unfolding event such as a storm or volcanic eruption using handheld digital cameras. They also can provide real-time assessment to determine whether environmental conditions, such as cloud cover, are favorable for data collection. 

The orbiting laboratory’s location at the upper edge of the Earth’s atmosphere allows researchers to study the effects of exposure of materials, electronics, and even microorganisms to the harsh space environment for long periods of time, then return those items and samples to the ground for detailed analysis. In addition, the station provides power, data transmission capacity, and repair capability for astrophysics instruments collecting data largely blocked by Earth’s atmosphere or magnetic field.  

Throughout the Benefits for Humanity publication you will find examples illustrating the wide range of scientific disciplines and technology demonstrations benefiting from International Space Station research. The impacts of these efforts can all be traced back to key aspects of the station’s unique location—the edge of space. 

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Brains in space: the importance of understanding the impact of long-duration spaceflight on spatial cognition and its neural circuitry

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• Published: 18 August 2021
• Volume 22 , pages 105–114, ( 2021 )

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• Alexander C. Stahn   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4030-4944 1 , 2 &
• Simone Kühn   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6823-7969 3 , 4  

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Fifty years after the first humans stepped on the Moon, space faring nations have entered a new era of space exploration. NASA’s reference mission to Mars is expected to comprise 1100 days. Deep space exploratory class missions could even span decades. They will be the most challenging and dangerous expeditions in the history of human spaceflight and will expose crew members to unprecedented health and performance risks. The development of adverse cognitive or behavioral conditions and psychiatric disorders during those missions is considered a critical and unmitigated risk factor. Here, we argue that spatial cognition, i.e., the ability to encode representations about self-to-object relations and integrate this information into a spatial map of the environment, and their neural bases will be highly vulnerable during those expeditions. Empirical evidence from animal studies shows that social isolation, immobilization, and altered gravity can have profound effects on brain plasticity associated with spatial navigation. We provide examples from historic spaceflight missions, spaceflight analogs, and extreme environments suggesting that spatial cognition and its neural circuitry could be impaired during long-duration spaceflight, and identify recommendations and future steps to mitigate these risks.

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Moon, mars and beyond: pushing the limits of human performance

On July 20, 1969, the world held its breath when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon and became the first humans to explore the lunar surface. Now about fifty years later, space faring civilizations such as China, Japan, Europe, and India have joined the US and Russia in a new era of space exploration that goes well beyond the Moon. Spaceflight will play an increasingly important role in accelerating technological developments and transfer, establishing gateways to foster deep space exploration, seeking extraterrestrial life, establishing lunar colonies, venturing into deep space, and sending humans to Mars. Private partnerships and entities are fueling this race. SpaceX has been the first private company to transport astronauts to orbit and the International Space Station (ISS). Reusable rockets and super heavy launch systems such as Starship are expected to reduce costs of interplanetary flight and accelerate the developments needed for the colonization of other planets. Similar approaches and technologies have been recently announced by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, coinciding with China’s announcement to send its first human crew to Mars in 2033 and establish a large-scale settlement on the Red Planet . No matter which nation will win the next phase of this new Space Race , it will push the limits of human health and performance.

Space is a naturally hostile environment characterized by reduced gravity levels and various environmental, operational, and psychological stressors (e.g., radiation, hyperpcapnia, little separation between rest and works schedules, social isolation and confinement). Future exploratory missions will be considerably longer than current standard ISS missions. NASA’s reference mission to Mars is expected to comprise 1100 days. Deep space exploratory class missions could even span decades. These expeditions are considered the most dangerous and difficult explorations in the history of human spaceflight, and will expose crew members to unprecedented health and performance risks. The development of adverse cognitive or behavioral conditions and psychiatric disorders during those missions is considered a critical and unmitigated risk factor (Slack et al. 2016 ).To ensure successful future human space exploration, the risks must be precisely identified. Tools need to be provided that foster the efficient their efficient monitoring and prediction of adverse effects of spaceflight on brain and cognitive performance. In addition, target-specific countermeasures have to be established that help mitigating neurobehavioral impairments that may put astronaut health and mission success at risk.

Risk of adverse brain and cognitive changes in response to long-duration spaceflight

Neuroimaging findings have revealed structural brain changes in response to spaceflight, including an upward shift of the brain, redistribution of cerebrospinal fluid, ventricular volume decreases, and widespread decreases in gray matter volume (Jillings et al. 2020 ; Roberts et al. 2017 ; Van Ombergen et al. 2018 , 2019 ). These findings seem to stand in contrast to data on cognitive performance, revealing only minor impairments in response to spaceflight (Strangman et al. 2014 ). Whether and to what extent these changes lead to operational impairments and adverse behavioral conditions is currently not well understood. Retrospective analyses investigating the relationships between changes in cognitive performance using NASA’s cognitive test battery WinSCAT (Kane et al. 2005 ) and whole-brain structural analyses are inconclusive. Higher total ventricular volume was associated with reduced accuracy on a symbol substitution task (“Code Substitution” test), and faster response speed in an n-back paradigm (“Running Memory Continuous Performance” test) (Roberts et al. 2019 ). Other findings from standard 6-month ISS missions have shown significant decrements in manual dexterity, dual-tasking, motion perception, and a considerable degradation of a virtual navigation, i.e., car driving task immediately after return from space (Moore et al. 2019 ). Whereas these effects are expected to be relatively short-lived, i.e., minutes up to several days, they are considered a substantial risk for exploratory space missions, which involve transitions between gravitational levels (Harm et al. 2015 ). Data from a 1-year mission using NASA’s Cognition battery (Basner et al. 2015 ), assessing the cognitive performance of ten neuropsychological tests, suggests that adverse cognitive effects can persist up to 6 months postflight (Garrett-Bakelman et al. 2019 ). According to a review of studies that were performed during space missions, current data do not support cognitive deficits in low Earth orbit (Strangman et al. 2014 ). However, because of different approaches, methodologies, study durations, and small sizes, the effects of spaceflight on cognitive functions remain to be determined. However, because of different approaches, methodologies, study durations, and small sizes, the effects of spaceflight on cognitive functions remain to be determined (Mammarella 2020 ). Together, these data raise several key questions: (1) Could more complex cognitive and operational tasks be more sensitive to changes of inflight performance? (2) Is the neural circuitry underlying these tasks affected by spaceflight? (3) What are the long-term consequences of spaceflight on these tasks?

Need to monitor visuospatial abilities before, during and after spaceflight

Operational performance can be assessed by simulating spaceflight-related tasks such as using robotic arms to capture a transiting spacecraft or to control a spacecraft to maneuver it and dock it to another vehicle (Ivkovic et al. 2019 ; Johannes et al. 2017 ). Successful completion of the maneuvers relates to various cognitive domains, including but not limited to situational awareness, planning, decision-making, object orientation, mental rotation, visual processing, fine motor control, and visual motor integration (Wong et al. 2020 ). It can be hypothesized that complex tasks assessing the encoding, processing, storage, and retrieval of visuospatial information could be particularly vulnerable during spaceflight. An analysis of shuttle missions revealed that touchdown speed in 20% of orbiter landings was outside acceptable limits, some of which were associated with pilot-induced oscillations, i.e., increasing flight corrections in opposite directions (Moore et al. 2008 ). In 1997, piloting errors during control of the TORU (Teleoperated Mode of (spacecraft) Control) system resulted in the collision of the supply spacecraft Progress M-34 with the MIR station, damaging the Spektr module and a solar panel (Morgan 2013 ). Likewise, several telerobotic incidents occurred on ISS, including a collision between the Canadarm2 , the shuttle payload door, an external antenna, and Canadarm in which the two robotic arms crossed within 1.5 m of each other (Moore et al. 2019 ).

Spatial updating, path integration, route learning, wayfinding, and cognitive mapping are also key to successfully navigating in small- and large-scale environments. The criticality of encoding representations about self-to-object relations and integrating this information into a spatial map of the environment for spaceflight operations was highlighted during the Apollo 14 mission. Astronauts Ed Mitchell and Alan Shepard had to walk to a crater located within a mile from their landing module. Having nearly reached the target destination, they had to abort the assignment because of spatial disorientation (Fig.  1 ). The difficulties associated with spatial navigation on the lunar surface were confirmed during the post-mission debriefs when Alan Shepard explained, “I felt that we had a navigation problem on EVA-2. I don't know why we didn't worry a little bit more about that pre-flight (…) Second, there’s no questions that it is easy to misjudge distances, not only above the surface [that is during the landing or from the Lunar Module windows] (…) but also distances along the surface.” (Heiken and Jones 2007 ).

Traverse of Astronauts Edgar D. Mitchell and Alan Shepard during extravehicular activity (EVA-2) of the Apollo 14 mission. ( a ) Edgar D. Mitchell moves across the lunar surface as he is studying a map, trying to figure out where they are in vain; both astronauts thought they were much closer to Cone Crater than they actually were, and they did not recognize any landmarks in their view (picture was taken at location B1). ( b ) Outline of the traverse from Lunar Module to Cone Crater via B1 and back. Station C1 indicates “Saddle Rock,” where the last sample was retrieved before returning to the Lunar Module. Neither astronaut noticed that “Saddle Rock” was depicted as a landmark on their map. It was only after the completion of the mission that they had realized that were only 30 m from the rim of Cone Crater. Picture Credit: NASA/USGS and Google

Finding your way in a new territory has always been a significant challenge for explorers. From an evolutionary perspective, the “(…) ability to estimate one’s own position and track and plan one’s own path in physical space is key to survival” ( Focus on Spatial Cognition 2017 ). To identify the time course of visuospatial abilities in response to spaceflight, we have developed a specific battery of tasks that was recently flight-certified for use on the ISS. This battery assesses visuospatial memory formation, topographic mapping, path integration, and spatial updating. The battery has been tested in various spaceflight analogs on Earth. Experiments performed during parabolic flight maneuvers have shown that spatial updating is sensitive to gravitational changes, including micro- and hyper-gravity (Stahn et al. 2020 ). Recently, Spatial Cognition was selected as part of NASA’s CIPHER Footnote 1 project. Spatial Cognition will investigate visuospatial changes and their neural basis in a total of 30 astronauts, equally assigned to 2-month, 6-month, and 1-year missions. Likewise, it will be essential to identify cortical and subcortical brain areas associated with the spatial encoding of landmark identities, retrieving spatial information, and processing visual features important for landmark recognition such as the hippocampal formation, striatum, precuneus, retrosplenial complex, parahippocampal place area, and the occipital place area (Epstein et al. 2017 ; Geerts et al. 2020 ; Hartley et al. 2014 ; Wolbers et al. 2008 ). The hippocampus is considered the human “inner” GPS by providing information about location (place cells of the hippocampus) relative to a grid map characterized by a hexagonal pattern generated by grid cell firing activity in the entorhinal cortex (Moser et al. 2015 ). Together, the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex play a critical role in exploring unfamiliar terrains, navigating on new planets, and performing complex operational visuospatial tasks (Fig.  2 ). To this aim, Spatial Cognition will combine behavioral data with multi-modal neuroimaging that are expected to provide new knowledge on the dose–response relationships between the length of spaceflight missions, brain changes, and their implications for spatial orientation and navigation. In addition, data will be collected up to a year after return from space to identify the time course of recovery.

Environmental, operational, and psychological stressors associated with spaceflight. Ionizing radiation, hypercapnia (increased CO 2 levels), altered vestibular stimulation and reduced physical activity in response to weightlessness, circadian disruptions and poor sleep due to altered day and night cycles, isolation and confinement, and sensory deprivation can have adverse effects on hippocampal plasticity. The hippocampus is critical for declarative memory formation, emotion processing, and spatial cognition. Together with the entorhinal cortex, the hippocampus supports the encoding, consolidation, and retrieval of spatial information by processing information about location (place cells of the hippocampus) relative to a grid map characterized by a hexagonal pattern (grid cells in the entorhinal cortex). Picture Credit: Schematic brain and hippocampus were created with BioRender.com . Spacecraft (middle) and right icon in bottom row (sensory deprivation): NASA; astronaut silhouette (third icon, bottom row) by Natasha Sinegina/CC BY); icon depicting Non-24h Day/Night cycles by icon-library.com

Environmental stressors, hippocampal plasticity and spatial cognition

The hippocampus, known as a highly plastic brain region that is key to complex spatial navigation, is vulnerable to various stressors associated with spaceflight, including but not limited to radiation, hypercapnia, altered vestibular stimulation, reduced physical activity levels, circadian disorders and poor sleep, sensory deprivation, and social isolation and confinement (Fig.  2 ). It is also possible that these stressors interact with each other. The strength and direction of such effects is currently not well understand, and also deserves further research.

Cosmic radiation is expected to be a critical risk for adverse neurobehavioral effects during spaceflight. Recent reviews reported considerable structural and functional damage of the brain that is particularly prominent in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus, and associated with a broad range of adverse behavioral conditions, including taste aversion, reversal learning deficits, disrupted reinforcement behavior, contextual fear conditioning, and spatial learning and memory formation (Kiffer et al. 2019 ).

Carbon dioxide

The limited capacity of air recycling systems on spacecraft can increase carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) levels and lead to hypoxia/hypercapnia. Typical concentrations of CO 2 on ISS range between 2 and 4 mmHg and can be up to ten-fold higher than on Earth (outdoors about 0.3 mmHg and in well-ventilated rooms about 0.5 mmHg). Animal studies have shown that chronic exposure to 0.3% CO 2 concentrations can impair brain plasticity and behavior during early development (Kiray et al. 2014 ). In contrast to earlier reports (Satish et al. 2012 ), recent data found no or little change of varying levels of CO 2 acutely on cognitive performance (Basner et al. 2021 ; Lee et al. 2019 ; Scully et al. 2019 ). The chronic effects of heightened CO 2 levels on complex visuospatial abilities remain to be determined.

Weightlessness

Weightlessness also affects the vestibular system, which goes beyond maintaining gaze and postural stabilization. Acute exposure to weightlessness and transitions between gravity levels significantly challenge the integration of neuro-vestibular signaling, associated with motion sickness and alterations in spatial abilities and sensorimotor functioning (Reschke and Clément 2018 ). Otoliths, graviceptors in the inner ear, rely on information from linear acceleration, and therefore cannot respond to tilt when gravity is lacking. Furthermore, projections of the vestibular pathways to the limbic system and neocortex play a critical role for brain plasticity, including spatial learning and memory formation (Smith 2017 ). Peripheral lesions of the vestibular pathways have been linked to atrophy in the hippocampus and spatial memory impairments that are long-lasting and may even be permanent (Smith et al. 2010 ).

Body unloading

The lack of gravity also diminishes physical activity, known as a critical driver for brain plasticity and cognition (Voss et al. 2013 ). We recently showed that long-duration bed rest (> 1 month) has detrimental effects on various cognitive processes, including episodic memory formation in the hippocampus and parahippocampus (Brauns et al. 2019 , 2021 ; Friedl-Werner et al. 2020 ). We also found that prolonged physical inactivity associated with bed rest induces circadian disruptions (Mendt et al. 2021a , b ).

Non-24 h light–dark cycles

Spaceflight is associated with circadian disruptions and adverse sleep (Barger et al. 2014 ; Flynn-Evans et al. 2016 ). A recent analysis of astronauts on standard ISS missions (average stay of 155 days) reported circadian misalignment in 20% of flight days and corresponding sleep losses of one hour per night (Flynn-Evans et al. 2016 ). Poor sleep is associated with neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric conditions and hippocampal atrophy (Fjell et al. 2020 ). Chronic sleep deprivation has also been shown to lead to hippocampal atrophy across the adult lifespan (Fjell et al. 2020 ). The detrimental effects of sleep on the hippocampus are independent of stress hormones (Mueller et al. 2008 ), and structural hippocampal alterations have been observed after brief periods of sleep deprivation (Raven et al. 2019 ).

Isolation, confinement, and sensory deprivation

Reduced sensory stimulation and sensory monotony experienced in isolated, confined, and extreme (ICE) environments are expected to be major contributors to adverse neurobehavioral conditions. Monotonous sensory stimulation, boredom, and isolation and confinement are severe stressors can lead to interpersonal tension and conflict, negative affect, work place errors, and increased mortality (Eastwood et al. 2012 ). For more than 30 years, space agencies have been investigating the effects of isolation and confinement using facilities designed to simulate spaceflight missions. These “laboratory” studies are characterized by highly controlled settings and have been referred to as isolated and controlled confinement (ICC) (Choukér and Stahn 2020 ). With few exceptions such as the Russian Mars500 study or the more recent SIRIUS projects using the NEK facility at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) in Moscow, these studies are typically limited to short durations (< 60 days). Laboratory experiments also lack the complexity, unpredictability and risks associated with actual expeditions in extreme environments. Exploration expeditions bear the potential to study the effects of prolonged isolation and confinement in natural extreme environments and have been become known as isolated confined and extreme environments (ICE). The first reported data on the behavioral effects of isolation and confinement date back to Polar explorers, providing anecdotal evidence of the psychological and physiological challenges associated with long-duration Antarctic expeditions (Palinkas and Suedfeld 2008 ). Previous research in ICCs and ICEs focused on mood disorders, asthenia, psychosomatic reactions, psychosocial adaptations, and psychiatric emergencies (Mcphee and Charles 2009 ). To what extent social isolation directly causes brain changes, and cognitive performance impairments is less clear. Animal studies have shown that stress and social isolation disrupt hippocampal neurogenesis (e.g., Cinini et al. 2014 ; Gould et al. 1997 ; Schloesser et al. 2010 ), prevents exercise-induced hippocampal neurogenesis (Leasure and Decker 2009 ; Pereda-Pérez et al. 2013 ; Stranahan et al. 2006 ), selectively reduces hippocampal brain-derived neurotrophic factor (Scaccianoce et al. 2006 ), and impairs hippocampal long-term potentiation (Kamal et al. 2014 ).

To investigate whether similar effects can be detected in humans, we recently investigated the neurobehavioral responses to prolonged isolation associated with Antarctic overwintering (Stahn et al. 2019 ). T 1 - and T 2 -weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data were collected before and 1.5 months after a 14-month expedition to Antarctica to assess structural brain changes and compare these data to a control group matched for sex, age, and educational background. Hippocampal subfield volumes decreased after the expedition, namely bilateral dentate gyrus volume was significantly smaller in the expeditioners than in the control group (mean group decrease in volume ± SE: 32 ± 13 mm 3 , equivalent to a 7.2 ± 3% volume reduction). Whole-brain analyses using voxel-based morphometry (VBM) revealed further decreases of gray matter probability in the left parahippocampus (mean group decrease ± SE: 3.84 ± 0.72%), and in the right lateral and left medial and right lateral prefrontal cortex (PFC) (mean group decrease ± SE: 3.33 ± 0.48%; left medial PFC: mean group decrease ± SE: 2.99 ± 0.25%). Brain-derived trophic factor (BDNF), a protein key to brain plasticity and learning and memory formation (Egan et al. 2003 ; Harward et al. 2016 ), was determined in serum blood samples collected before, ten times during, and once after the expedition. After the first quarter of the expedition, serum BDNF concentration was reduced compared to the baseline measurement before the expedition and did not recover at 1.5 months after the end of the expedition (mean reduction ± SE: 11 ± 1.5 ng/mL, 45 ± 4.9%). Reductions in BDNF from pre- to post-mission were associated with decreases in dentate gyrus volume ( R 2  = 0.47). The reductions in dentate gyrus volume were also associated with lower cognitive performance in tests of spatial processing ( R 2  = 0.87) and the resolution of response conflict ( R 2  = 0.82), but there was no reduction in performance in other cognitive tests (i.e., Digit Symbol Substitution, Stroop Congruent task).

Need for target-specific countermeasures

To mitigate adverse neurobehavioral effects of prolonged spaceflight on spatial cognition and its neural basis, target-specific countermeasure will be needed that go beyond current practices such as exercise, lower body negative pressure, and nutritional supplementation. For instance, specific types of video gaming have the potential to enhance brain plasticity (Kühn et al. 2014a , b ; 2017 ). Further, specific training programs aimed at improving operational performance skills (e.g., Johannes et al. 2017 ) can be expected to improve visuospatial abilities and affect their neural circuitry. Moreover, combining physical activity with virtual environments could be promising (Vessel and Russo 2015 ). Preliminary data analyses of the NASA sponsored project Hybrid Training showed that voluntary exercise on bicycle ergometer combined with a visual sensory stimulation could mitigate some of the neurobehavioral effects in response to 14 months of isolation and confinement associated with overwintering at Neumayer III station in Antarctica. These effects were manifested as increased BDNF concentrations and reductions in hippocampal subfield volume and whole-brain gray matter and support the role of physical activity as a key driver of brain plasticity (Vivar and van Praag 2017 ).

Given the range of environmental, operational and psychological conditions and stressors, it is expected that there is no single countermeasure that will serve as a universal remedy. In addition, it is possible that the responses to the countermeasures will vary between individuals. Countermeasure must therefore be understood as a dynamic construct that is optimized relative to the individual needs as a function of mission duration. The concept of individualized countermeasure that we like to term as “ICount” is summarized in Fig.  3 . A multiplicity of methodologies and approaches could be combined in a toolbox that is flexibly adapted to address the crews’ individual needs. The countermeasures range from habitat design (e.g., lighting, personal and social space), to exercise, workload considerations including variations in meaningful work, sleep/rest schedules, relaxation techniques, videogaming, entertainment, virtual reality, plants, food, and other sensory augmentation measures, to strategies for maintaining and enhancing crew cohesion, psychological counseling and family support. The variety of approaches will be critical to maximize the stimulation and their synergies, and consider phenotypic differences, and the dynamic nature of individual preferences for specific needs during long-duration expeditions.

Individualized countermeasures (ICount) to mitigate adverse neurobehavioral effects. To mitigate the neurobehavioral risks associated with long-duration spaceflight, a comprehensive “toolbox” of countermeasures is needed. The figure lists some examples that will play a critical role in reducing the risks of adverse cognitive and behavioral effects and psychiatric disorders during long-duration expeditions. Some of the countermeasures listed such as exercise, videogaming, diet and nutritional supplementation, sleep hygiene, and self-adapted visuo-spatial learning tasks will also help to maintain hippocampal plasticity and spatial cognition. The relationships between individual countermeasures will vary between and within individuals. The relative importance of specific strategies will vary during the course of mission, requiring a constant reevaluation of the crewmembers’ individual needs. Note that the figure is a schematic illustration, and the weights of the interventions are used to reflect their dynamic nature through an expedition, but do not suggest any importance of one countermeasure over the other

Summary and Conclusions

Outer space is considered the most extreme environment for human mankind. Without support systems and protective suits, life in space or on other planets in our solar system is not possible. Even prolonged stays in the habitat of a spacecraft pose significant physiological and psychological challenges. Spaceflight affects every organ system. In addition to microgravity the spacecraft setting is characterized by multiple environmental toxicants and operational stressors such as radiation, noise, hypercapnia, hypoxia, decompression, dietary restrictions, fluid shifts, increased intracranial pressure, non-24 h light–dark cycles, acute operational shifts in sleep timing, psychological factors related to high workload under pressure, operational and interpersonal distress, and isolation and confinement. The effects of space travel on brain and behavior are currently not well understood but are considered a high and unmitigated risk for future long-duration space missions.

Studies in animals and ground-based spaceflight analogs suggest that the spatial cognition and its neural basis could be particularly vulnerable to future long-duration space missions. Future studies are therefore critically needed to (1) understand the effects of extreme environments and spaceflight on spatial cognition and its neural circuitry, (2) demonstrate and verify the techniques needed to monitor, diagnose, and prevent such effects, and (3) develop target-specific countermeasures to mitigate adverse effects on visuospatial abilities. In addition, imaging and cognitive data should be complemented by biochemical assessments, and advances in multi-omics technologies such as genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics. They will be critical to close knowledge gaps of the underlying molecular mechanisms and genetic drivers of neurobehavioral adaptations in extreme environments. Combining brain imaging, cognitive and biochemical methodologies, and outcomes could provide the basis to better understand and characterize the type, extent, cause, and mechanisms of adverse neurobehavioral effects and their phenotypic signatures.

The integration of imaging, physiological, biochemical, and behavioral data will contribute to the space agencies’ goal to provide knowledge, technologies, and tools to enable safe, reliable, and productive human space exploration. At the same time, they can also benefit research and applications on Earth. Spaceflight analogs such as isolation experiments, Antarctic expeditions, and bed rest studies, can provide unique standardized settings that induce neurophysiological and psychological conditions that typically evolve over long time spans, and cannot be replicated in typical laboratory settings. The opportunity to study prospectively the time course of brain and behavioral changes in time lapse in healthy adults, characterize them before any clinical manifestations occur, and follow them up through recovery can help understand the effects and the biological basis of aging-related cognitive decline, social isolation, clinical manifestations associated with impaired physical mobility, or lifestyle changes in response to pandemics.

CIPHER stands for Complement of Integrated Protocols for Human Exploration Research, and is a project comprising 17 investigators that integrate various disciplines to investigate multiple physiological, biological, and psychological aspects to short-duration (2-months), standard-duration (6-months), and long-duration (12-months) human spaceflight missions.

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Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. The work indicated here are supported by the German Aerospace Agency (DLR) through Grants 50WB1525, 50WB1915, and 50WB2115.

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Alexander C. Stahn

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Stahn, A.C., Kühn, S. Brains in space: the importance of understanding the impact of long-duration spaceflight on spatial cognition and its neural circuitry. Cogn Process 22 (Suppl 1), 105–114 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10339-021-01050-5

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Space Medicine: Scientific Foundations, Achievements, and Challenges

A. i. grigor’ev.

Institute of Biomedical Problems, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

O. I. Orlov

V. m. baranov.

This article, based on a report presented at the Scientific Session of the Russian Academy of Sciences, highlights the history of the formation of space medicine, its theoretical foundations, and the role of scientists of the Academy of Sciences in the preparation and implementation of the first manned flight into space. The achievements of domestic specialists in space physiology, biology, and medicine promoting the development of manned cosmonautics are considered. Examples are given of the implementation of the results of space research, as well as instruments and devices for medical support of space crews, into practical health care. The problems of medical support of future interplanetary flights and the ways of their solution are analyzed.

Sixty years ago, an event took place that was of tremendous universal significance—the first human flight into space. The flight of our compatriot Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin became not only our national pride but also the beginning of the realization of the aspirations of many generations of people living on planet Earth. Therefore, it is not by chance that the United Nations at its General Assembly designated April 12 as the International Day of Human Space Flight.

American astronaut Neil Armstrong said about Gagarin: “He called us all into space.” In the first place, this phrase means the burst of enthusiasm of scientists all over the world regarding the provision of spaceflights and the creation of broad international cooperation in this area—cooperation that has been successfully carried out at various levels ever since. That enthusiasm involved representatives of medicine as well. April 12, 1961, was the birthday of not only manned cosmonautics but also space medicine. Like cosmonautics, space medicine was born long before its official formation.

Scientific foundations of space medicine. This new direction in medicine did not arise from scratch. Preparation for a manned flight into space took place against the background of the formation of a system of knowledge based on evolutionary and environmental physiology, the physiology of extreme states, and occupational physiology, and it was this system that formed the basis for the subsequent emergence and development of space, i.e., gravitational, physiology, which became the cornerstone of space medicine. This work was mainly carried out by the students and followers of Academician I.P. Pavlov’s scientific school. As is known, cosmonautics has its own theoretician and practitioner. Regarding space medicine, we can say that the theorist was L.A. Orbeli—a representative of Pavlov’s school, who was directly in charge of all issues related to human spaceflights [ 1 ]. The practitioners were aviation doctors, of the military, whose shining representative was V.I. Yazdovskii [ 2 ]. In 1947, the Institute of Aviation Medicine of the USSR Ministry of Defense was created, and the first group of young specialists came to work at this research institute. Many of them, after decades, were rightfully called the founders of Russian space medicine.

Practical work started in the early 1950s under the leadership of S.P. Korolev with the participation of Academicians V.N. Chernigovskii, N.M. Sisakyan, and V.A. Engel’gardt, and other prominent figures of the Academy of Sciences [ 3 ]. Animals (dogs) were the first to fly into space. These studies were naturally continued on the artificial biological satellites of the Earth Sputnik 2 and Sputnik 5, which proved the fundamental possibility of a safe orbital flight of biological beings under controlled conditions and the tracking of biological functions. The first short-term human spaceflights from the point of view of the influence of the factors of outer space on the human organism were safe; however, as the duration of flights increased, the unfavorable effects of a long stay in zero gravity began to show up. This was especially evident after the 17-day flight of the crew of Soyuz 9. The tasks were posed related to the systematic study of the influence of the conditions of stay in space on the human body, with the aim of developing means and methods for preserving the health and working capacity of crew members of spaceships and stations.

As early as 1963, on the initiative of Korolev and M.V. Keldysh with the active participation of USSR Deputy Minister of Health A.I. Burnazyan, the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IMBP) was created, which had originally been called the Institute of Space Medicine, but then, for a number of reasons, it was given a broader name. The development of the Institute’s research at different times was influenced by its first directors—Academicians A.V. Lebedinskii, V.V. Parin, and O.G. Gazenko. The Institute, in broad cooperation with the institutions of the Academy of Sciences and other departments and in collaboration with foreign colleagues, launched active work to study the influence of spaceflight factors on the human body.

Achievements of space medicine. The research was extensive, both in spaceflights and on the ground when simulating the conditions for the stay of cosmonauts in near-earth orbit.

The influence of the factors of orbital spaceflights on the cardiovascular system was studied by the institute’s associates under the guidance of Academicians Parin, A.A. Myasnikov, and E.I. Chazov. The leading role of the movement of fluid media into the upper half of the body in the occurrence of negative reactions of the cardiovascular system to weightlessness was established [ 4 ].

Academicians Yu.V. Natochin and A.I. Grigor’ev showed the negative impact of flight conditions on kidney function [ 5 ]. This research direction made it possible to move on to another important problem, which was related to the regulation of water‒salt metabolism; a whole scientific school arose. The followers of this school RAS Corresponding Members B.V. Morukov and L.B. Buravkova and Academician O.I. Orlov with colleagues studied the problem of impaired calcium metabolism in spaceflights and the leaching of calcium from bone tissue, observed after space missions. Appropriate preventive measures were developed [ 6 , 7 ]. Undoubtedly important were the results of studies of the effect of spaceflights on the respiratory system, carried out under the leadership of Academician Baranov. Significant changes in the system of external respiration and gas exchange under microgravity conditions were established; these changes lead to a decrease in the partial tension of oxygen in the blood (hypoxemia) [ 8 , 9 ].

Recall the works of Academician V.S. Gurfinkel’, RAS Corresponding Member I.B. Kozlovskaya, and their followers, which led to the formulation of the concept of hypogravity motor syndrome as a complex of factors that disrupt motor function in flight [ 10 ].

Of course, the implementation of the flight program at domestic orbital stations would have been impossible without research by the domestic school of psychophysiology, represented by Academicians P.V. Simonov and M.M. Khananashvili and a number of other scientists [ 11 ]. One cannot but mention space gastroenterology, founded by Academician A.M. Ugolev and his students, who developed recommendations for organizing meals for cosmonauts in relation to various flight conditions and functional states and even with account for the national characteristics of crew members [ 12 ].

In addition note life support systems, created with the active participation of not only scientists, designers, and technologists but also doctors. It was they who, with their knowledge of human physiology and reserve and adaptive capabilities, formulated the medical and technical requirements for systems that ensure a safe comfortable life and activities of crew members in the confined conditions of spacecraft and participated in tests of life support systems for compliance with sanitary standards. Regarding the life support systems for cosmonauts, note the works on biological life support systems carried out under the leadership of Academician I.I. Gitel’zon at the IMBP in Moscow and at the Institute of Biophysics in Krasnoyarsk. The results of these studies are important in the light of the upcoming tasks of deep space exploration [ 13 , 14 ].

Of even greater importance for future interplanetary missions are issues of radiobiology and radiation safety. At one time, these issues were dealt with by the staff of the Biophysics Institute under the leadership of Academician L.A. Il’in [ 15 ]. At the IMBP, a laboratory with similar tasks in relation to spaceflights was headed by Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences E.I. Vorob’ev. At present, the teams of Academician M.A. Ostrovskii and RAS Corresponding Member E.A. Krasavin, as well as other scientists, are involved in studies on the possible consequences of the high radiation level beyond the Earth’s magnetic field for the health of cosmonauts. They have managed to develop a system of measures to ensure the radiation safety of manned orbital flights, which allows us to feel optimistic about the possibility of creating such a system for future interplanetary missions.

The most important achievement of space medicine during the period from Gagarin’s flight to this day is the creation of a system of medical and epidemiological support for space expeditions with a duration equal to a flight to Mars and back. The cosmonaut doctor V.V. Polyakov spent almost 438 days in space. The system, which includes various means and methods of maintaining the health and working capacity of cosmonauts, is based on the knowledge gained by scientists working in various fields of basic medicine.

Space medicine and health care . The progress of space medicine was accompanied by a very important effect—practical access not only to cosmonautics but also to practical health care. We have learned to understand better the state of the physiological norm and the border between norm and pathology and to assess the functional reserves of the body and the body’s response to various extreme influences. The equipment and the methods and means of prophylaxis that have been developed to monitor the health status of cosmonauts have found application in clinical medicine. In this process, an important role was played by the Academy of Sciences and its two programs: Basic Sciences in Medicine (headed by Academicians Gazenko and Grigor’ev) and Innovation and Technology Support (Academicians G.A. Mesyats and S.M. Aldoshin). These programs, mutually complementing one another, created a unified system of innovative developments from basic research to the stage of commercialization. The experience of these programs should be studied and used to expand and accelerate the processes of introducing the results in the field of space research into our life on Earth. An example of the successful implementation of the results of these programs is the introduction of the Regent suit and the Korvit device into the practice of rehabilitation of patients with neuromuscular pathology. These products are successfully used in clinics not only in our country but also abroad.

In his annual message on April 20, 2021, President V.V. Putin mentioned telemedicine as one of the important elements that had proven to be effective in the situation with the COVID-19 pandemic. Telemedicine began as a space tool. Over the years, a lot has been done, primarily by the team led by Academician Grigor’ev together with Moscow State University, the University of Medicine and Dentistry, Nizhny Novgorod University, and other organizations, to adapt space telemedicine technologies to ground-based applications. The foundations of telemedicine education have been created, and the technologies of organizational and legal support of this area of health care have been developed [ 16 ]. Telemedicine turned out to be a toolkit that once again proved its effectiveness in the fight against coronavirus infection. The knowledge gained by space physicians in the field of physiological, physical, and psychological stress in conditions of prolonged isolation turned out to be in demand. Now this work will continue as part of a world-class center—the Pavlov Center for Integrative Physiology, which was created on the base of the Pavlov Institute of Physiology, the Sechenov Institute of Evolutionary Physiology and Biochemistry, the IMBP, and St. Petersburg Electrotechnical University.

Current challenges. At the current stage of manned cosmonautics, the attention of most scientists and designers is focused on the problem of interplanetary flights. It must be admitted that the technology of medical support for such missions will be fundamentally different from what is used now during orbital flights. First, specialists will face factors that have not been encountered before: the absence of the Earth’s magnetic field, galactic radiation, etc. Second, it will be necessary to change the paradigm of preventive measures, which should become more flexible and personalized and involve the use of artificial gravity. The paradigm of medical support in the conditions of autonomous space flights should be based on the wide use of artificial intelligence, which we call among ourselves the smart telemedicine outline . It is necessary to create the scientific and technological groundwork for a wider application of robotic means and advanced technologies at the later stages of human expansion into space.

Of course, we must bear in mind the technologies that should be developed on the eve of the start of the program for the exploration of the Moon—exploration, not just a visit. In this regard, a number of issues require serious study, in particular, the problem of moondust. Work in this direction has already begun and must be intensified. We mean the program of participation in flights of unmanned stations to the Moon and to its surface and the BION-M program. Considering the planned changes in the federal space program, it will be necessary to correct the flight program of the BION-M 2 biological satellite, the main mission of which is a comprehensive assessment of the effect of space radiation on living organisms. Soon, we hope, the Return program (Noah’s Ark) will begin to be implemented, which will allow assessing the state of biological objects after a long stay in interplanetary space. A special biological research program is being prepared for the transport ship that will fly around the Moon in the unmanned mode. The results obtained will allow specialists to assess the degree of risks and take measures to preserve the health and performance of cosmonauts during moon missions more accurately.

Let us outline in brief the International Space Station project. The biomedical part of the Long-Term Program of Scientific and Applied Research and Experiments Planned on the ISS Russian Segment is presented in two sections: Man in Space and Space Biology and Biotechnology. They will continue until the end of the existence of the ISS, with an emphasis on advanced Russian programs. Everything that is proposed for space missions is initially investigated on earth under the conditions of complex experiments on various models.

Work on space exploration, especially in the field of space medicine, has been carried out practically from the very beginning of manned space exploration with broad international cooperation. One of the examples is the Interkosmos program, organized on the initiative and under the leadership of the Academy of Sciences and headed by Academician B.N. Petrov, within the framework of which research was carried out not only in space physics and other areas but also in space biology and medicine. Noteworthy is the Russian‒American cooperation in the field of space medicine, supervised by the State Corporation Roscosmos and the Academy of Sciences on the Russian side and NASA on the American side. This work is coordinated by the Russian‒American Joint Working Group on Research in Space Biology and Medicine, which turns 50 this year. Over the years, it was headed by Academicians Gazenko and Grigor’ev. Recently, the Russian party has put forward the concept of creating an international center for testing the technology of medical support for interplanetary missions. Within the framework of this concept, the SIRIUS program is being implemented, which was created by the IMBP RAS jointly with NASA with the participation of other international partners. The program is a series of isolation experiments in which scientists have already begun to develop techniques for future interplanetary flights.

Further development of space medicine technologies lies at the intersection of many sciences, and it is important not only to develop the traditional cooperation of physiologists, physicians, and biologists, which has always been a success under the auspices of the Academy of Sciences, but also the participation of mathematicians, chemists, IT specialists, physicists, and representatives of other disciplines. The role and active position of the RAS Council on Space is exceptionally important in this respect.

RAS Academician Anatolii Ivanovich Grigor’ev is Academic Advisor of the RAS Institute of Biomedical Problems (IMBP RAS). RAS Academician Oleg Igorevich Orlov is Director of the IMBP RAS. RAS Academician Viktor Mikhailovich Baranov is Head of a research group at the same institute.

Translated by B. Alekseev

Contributor Information

A. I. Grigor’ev, Email: ur.pbmi@veirogirg .

O. I. Orlov, Email: ur.pbmi@volro .

V. M. Baranov, Email: ur.pbmi@ofni .

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The future space environment

As our planet becomes increasingly reliant on space, the UK is working to be at the forefront of space protection and sustainability.

Our use of space is rapidly evolving. The National Space Operations Centre (NSpOC) is preparing for the future now to ensure the UK is ready for the challenges and opportunities that await.

Powered by a global network of space sensors and a team of dedicated civilian and military analysts, we protect UK interests in space and on Earth, 365 days a year.  

Why understanding the future of the space environment matters

The orbital landscape is changing rapidly. Launching spacecraft has become considerably more affordable ( there has been a 95% cost reduction from around $65,000/kg to $1,500/kg for heavy launch to Lower Earth Orbit (LEO) ).

Couple this with an ever-increasing reliance on satellite data and it’s easy to understand the boom in human-made objects being launched into our orbital environment. The number of active satellites in orbit, as of April 2024, reached over 9,000 and some reports suggest that by 2030, we could have more than 60,000 active satellites in space .

This graph shows the growth in the number of satellites in orbit since 2000. Data is from OECD The Economics of Space Sustainability 2022 and ESA Space Debris ‘by the numbers’.

Understanding the future of space is critical to planning our response to protect UK interests going forwards which is why we’re now developing our future sensor strategy and Space Domain Awareness (SDA) capability.

The four future scenarios

We commissioned InTandem and Raytheon to support us in developing a sensor and data strategy. As part of the strategy, four scenarios have been developed, using the GO-Science futures toolkit, to predict how the space environment might look over the next 10 years.

The Cosmic Bazaar

Growing private investment creates an environment where companies lead the charge, pursuing their own interests and projects independently pioneering their own projects without being tied to central government regulations. It’s a dynamic ecosystem where competition breeds innovation, leading to breakthroughs at every turn.

Corporate Cosmos

In this scenario, major corporations and private space agencies join forces to explore space together. It’s a unified approach where public and private sectors work hand-in-hand, propelling space exploration forward through collaboration and efficiency.

Nebular Nations

Here, governments take the reins, each pursuing their own space agenda independently. It’s a mosaic of different approaches and capabilities, with limited collaboration between nations. Space becomes a geopolitical playing field, with tensions on Earth translating to actions in orbit.

Global Space Directorate

Picture a world where governments unite to shape the future of space. It’s a coordinated effort where international alliances drive exploration and governance. Space isn’t fragmented; it’s a symphony of global collaboration.

We are working with our international partners to determine what the future of space should be.

The future of space

The future of space is filled with possibilities and by understanding these potential scenarios, NSpOC and its partners can better prepare for what lies ahead, ensuring that we continue to protect UK interests on Earth and in space for years to come.

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UAE astronaut and Expedition 69 Flight Engineer Sultan Alneyadi observes a free-flying Astrobee robotic assistant onboard the International Space Station.

Media Credit: Image courtesy of NASA

ISS National Lab Announces Up to $750,000 in Funding for Technology Development in Low Earth Orbit

May 14, 2024

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER (FL) , May 14, 2024 – The International Space Station (ISS) National Laboratory is soliciting flight concepts for technology development that would utilize the space-based environment of the orbiting laboratory. This solicitation, “Technology Development and Applied Research Leveraging the ISS National Lab,” is open to a broad range of technology areas, including chemical and material synthesis in space, translational medicine, in-space edge computing, and ISAM (in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing). It also encompasses the application of space station remote sensing data to improve geospatial analytics for commercial use.

Space-based technology development and demonstration is a strategic priority for the ISS National Lab, as it provides an opportunity for accelerated technology maturation that may enable advancements to improve life on Earth and build commerce in low Earth orbit (LEO).

Through this research announcement, respondents may propose to use the unique environment of the orbiting platform to develop, test, or mature products and processes that have a demonstrated potential to produce near-term and positive direct or indirect economic impact. Flight concepts selected via this research announcement may be awarded funding to enable mission integration and operations support for projects that will be implemented on the space station.

This research announcement will follow a two-step proposal submission process. Before being invited to submit a full proposal, all interested investigators must submit a Step 1: Concept Summary for review. The Center for the Advancement of Science in Space™, manager of the ISS National Lab, will host a webinar on Wednesday, May 22, at 1 p.m. EDT to discuss space station facilities and capabilities associated with this research announcement.

Step 1: Concept Summaries must be submitted by the end of the day on July 12, 2024. Step 2: Full Proposals from those invited to submit will be due by the end of the day October 2, 2024. Multiple projects are expected to be awarded through this research announcement with up to $750,000 in total funding available.

Emphasis areas for this solicitation include but are not limited to:

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‘I Wouldn’t Have This in My Kitchen’

Interior designer Jen Nash said practical choices in a kitchen are important because homeowners spend so much time in the space.

WASHINGTON – When designing your kitchen, there are so many things to consider, from the colors and layout to the appliances and materials. A kitchen design should be thought of as a long-term investment, considering it’s one of the most expensive areas to renovate in a home.

Yet, two-thirds of about 2,000 consumers recently surveyed about their kitchen remodel say they have design regrets, according to a study from Magnet Kitchens. They wish they had spent more on storage, countertop space, more lighting and power sockets and better quality materials.

“When it comes to designing your kitchen, it's imperative that you make practical choices. You spend so much of your time in the space and with this in mind, it's important that you’re fond of every element,” says Jen Nash, head of design at Magnet Kitchens. “From colors to materials, there are certain design choices that I strongly advise against.”

Considering the regret of remodelers, Nash reveals what she wouldn’t have in her kitchen and what she suggests to renovators to avoid.

Harsh lighting

“Harsh lighting doesn’t belong in the kitchen,” Nash says. “The kitchen as a space has evolved and has become the social hub of the home. With this in mind, it needs to be warm and welcoming, and harsh bright white lighting can completely eliminate any warm ambiance.” She suggests choosing lighting temperatures for the kitchen that are warmer, as opposed to bulbs in white light, which is extra bright. “Harsh lighting can highlight areas that might need a clean and make scuffs and scratch marks more visible,” she says.

Overbearing use of color

“While I am an extremely big fan of colorful kitchens, I do believe that too much color can be overbearing and ruin the aesthetic of the space,” Nash says. “Dark colors—including dark browns and reds—as well as bright colors are beautiful in moderation, however, you can definitely use too much of them.”

For homeowners wanting to add a bold color to spice up their kitchen, she suggests using it in moderation and along with lighter, more muted hues of color. “This will make the space look more cohesive and avoid an overwhelming aesthetic,” Nash says. “As I did with my very own kitchen, opt for a slightly muted shade across kitchen cupboards and then accessorize with darker, bolder tones.”

Not choosing materials and finishes thoughtfully

“One of the biggest kitchen design ‘don’ts’ is in choosing a material based on the way it looks, without researching its properties and practicalities,” Nash says. “While a particular material may be nice on the eye, it could be a complete nightmare to clean and maintain—it could also be potentially hazardous.”

She recommends against using plastic laminate in the kitchen. “While it’s an affordable material, it is prone to chipping easily and can impact the aesthetic of the space in the medium-to-long term,” she says.

Another material Nash often recommends avoiding is high gloss. “While it is a desirable finish for some, it is known to show dirt and scratches easily and isn’t particularly suitable for those with a young family,” she says.

Inefficient appliances

“When designing a kitchen, one of the first things I’d look into is how efficient are the appliances I’m planning on purchasing,” Nash says. “Inefficient appliances are a no-go. The kitchens of the future are poised to prioritize sustainability, with an emphasis on minimizing their environmental footprint.” Energy-efficient appliances may cost more initially, but they can offer homeowners savings on utility costs over the long term. 

Nash says in her kitchen she prioritized quality appliances, like a boiling water tap. She says it’s “one of the best features in my kitchen—I use it every day.”

L-shaped kitchens

Demand for L-shaped kitchens is on the decline, with online searches falling for this style of kitchen layout, Nash says. “I can see the appeal of an L-shaped kitchen to some homeowners, [but] I don’t think they are the best use of a space,” Nash says.

Instead, she favors the one-wall configuration that includes an island for kitchen layouts. “I think this helps to maximize the space I have available,” she says. The one-wall layout is space-saving and also versatile, accommodating various functions within a more compact footprint, Nash says. Still, make sure there’s enough room for the kitchen island. “While I love my kitchen island, the design feature only works in certain spaces,” she says. “In some instances, they can completely overwhelm the space, especially if square footage is limited in the first place. I would only suggest having a kitchen island if you have adequate room and it won’t look out of place.”

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• Published: 12 June 2023

Future space experiment platforms for astrobiology and astrochemistry research

• Andreas Elsaesser   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-3781-8290 1 ,
• David J. Burr   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4208-034X 1 ,
• Paul Mabey 1 ,
• Riccardo Giovanni Urso   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6926-1434 2 ,
• Daniela Billi 3 ,
• Charles Cockell   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-3662-0503 4 ,
• Hervé Cottin   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9170-5265 5 ,
• Adrienne Kish 6 ,
• Natalie Leys 7 ,
• Jack J. W. A. van Loon   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9051-6016 8 ,
• Eva Mateo-Marti   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4709-4676 9 ,
• Christine Moissl-Eichinger 10 ,
• Silvano Onofri   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8872-1440 11 ,
• Richard C. Quinn 12 ,
• Elke Rabbow 13 ,
• Petra Rettberg   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4439-2395 13 ,
• Rosa de la Torre Noetzel 14 ,
• Klaus Slenzka 15 ,
• Antonio J. Ricco   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-2355-4984 12 ,
• Jean-Pierre de Vera   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9530-5821 16 &
• Frances Westall 17  

npj Microgravity volume  9 , Article number:  43 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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• Biogeochemistry
• Environmental sciences
• Microbiology
• Techniques and instrumentation

Space experiments are a technically challenging but a scientifically important part of astrobiology and astrochemistry research. The International Space Station (ISS) is an excellent example of a highly successful and long-lasting research platform for experiments in space, that has provided a wealth of scientific data over the last two decades. However, future space platforms present new opportunities to conduct experiments with the potential to address key topics in astrobiology and astrochemistry. In this perspective, the European Space Agency (ESA) Topical Team Astrobiology and Astrochemistry (with feedback from the wider scientific community) identifies a number of key topics and summarizes the 2021 “ESA SciSpacE Science Community White Paper” for astrobiology and astrochemistry. We highlight recommendations for the development and implementation of future experiments, discuss types of in situ measurements, experimental parameters, exposure scenarios and orbits, and identify knowledge gaps and how to advance scientific utilization of future space-exposure platforms that are either currently under development or in an advanced planning stage. In addition to the ISS, these platforms include CubeSats and SmallSats, as well as larger platforms such as the Lunar Orbital Gateway. We also provide an outlook for in situ experiments on the Moon and Mars, and welcome new possibilities to support the search for exoplanets and potential biosignatures within and beyond our solar system.

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Introduction.

More than two decades of experiments on the ISS have had, and continue to have, a strong impact on research, science, and society as a whole 1 , 2 , 3 . The growing number of astrobiology and astrochemistry experiments onboard the ISS provides new insights and knowledge, which, via new products, techniques, and technology, have a long-lasting effect on our daily lives and culture 4 . Astrobiology and astrochemistry address some of the most exciting questions to be asked by humankind, including the origins of life on Earth, life elsewhere in the universe or the exploration and colonization of other planets. A major topic in astrobiology and astrochemistry is radiation and the influence of the space environment or planetary conditions on biological systems and molecules. While laboratory facilities can simulate some individual parameters, it is not currently possible to faithfully replicate the space environment on the ground. In this respect, the ISS provides an excellent platform to perform irradiation experiments beyond the protective atmosphere of the Earth. Beyond the ISS, the design and implementation of new platforms (such as small satellite platforms, CubeSats 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 or the Lunar Orbital Gateway 10 ) offer new possibilities for experiments in space. The latter will rely heavily on machine learning and other advances in artificial intelligence, in particular for navigation 11 , 12 and on-the-fly repair of hardware 13 , a trend that will surely continue in the future.

In 2020, the astrobiology and astrochemistry science community in Europe was tasked by ESA to provide an up-to-date scientific roadmap for the utilization of current and future space platforms (ESA SciSpacE Science Community White Papers: esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/HRE/SciSpacE_Roadmaps.pdf ). This work was supported by ESA and builds upon work by previous ESA topical teams and experts in the field who extensively reviewed the scientific literature and the possibilities to advance our knowledge and understanding in astrobiology and astrochemistry research 3 , 14 , 15 . In addition to ground-based research, platforms, and concepts for experiments in space have been explored and discussed. To best utilize such space platforms, a number of top science objectives and related sub-objectives were identified. The interdisciplinary nature of this field prevents prioritization among these closely interwoven topics. Figure 1 shows the main themes and key areas that have been recognized and agreed upon. They consist of (A) Understanding the origins of life, (B) Understanding habitability and the limits of life, and (C) Understanding the signs of life. Each key topic and its sub-topics are described in more detail in the following sections:

As identified in the 2021 ESA SciSpacE Science Community White Paper (esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/HRE/10_Biology_Astrobiology.pdf), key astrobiology and astrochemistry topics are A understanding the origins of life, B understanding the habitability of life and C understanding the signs of life.

The origins of life—topic A

Life on Earth is currently our only accessible and scientific comprehensive reference for astrobiology studies. How life originated on Earth is a central question to inform and guide our search for life beyond our planet.

While the Earth’s environment, with stable liquid water at the surface, is unique in the Solar System today, this was not always the case. When life emerged on Earth (maybe more than 4 billion years ago), the environment was more similar to that of the other early rocky planets in the Solar System, such as Mars or perhaps Venus. Similarly, subsurface liquid water is present on icy moons such as Europa or Enceladus. As these environments resemble subglacial Antarctic lakes found on Earth (which are known to harbor a diverse assemblage of microorganisms 16 ), icy moons are highly interesting candidates in the search for life. Despite these similarities, beyond our solar system and among the expanding number of known exoplanets, an analog of either the early Earth or the Earth today has yet to be found. It is crucial to understand the composition and role of the primitive atmosphere and the lithosphere (e.g., organic synthesis in hydrothermal vents), as well as the role of solar radiation, taking into account a different atmospheric composition than today’s and a faint young sun. These are all critical factors to be addressed in assessing both the specific and general roles of the Earth’s environment.

It is now commonly accepted that a significant part of the organic material in early Earth’s environment was provided via meteorites and micrometeorites, originating from carbonaceous asteroids and comets 17 , 18 , 19 . It is therefore important to understand the origin and formation of such material and how the journey through space influences organic material before it was delivered to Earth. With this in mind, various questions arise regarding the role of exogenous organic material delivery by small cosmic bodies, including but not limited to: where and how was the organic matter formed and how was it incorporated into small bodies or planetesimals; how radiation affects the formation of organic compounds; how much of this material was delivered to Earth; how might the mineral matrix of the small bodies change during space travel; how the physicochemical properties of inorganic and mineral surfaces may have affected the formation, nature, preservation, amount and local distribution of organic material; do these factors play a protective role against space radiation or atmospheric entry; and what is the significance of exogenously delivered organic material versus endogenous organics in the prebiotic chemistry leading to the origins of life 20 ?

A key point in studying the origin of life is to understand abiogenesis; the transition from purely chemical, to a molecular prebiotic phase, and finally to a living and replicative system. Defining life as an auto-replicative system that evolves by natural selection, we can state that chemistry naturally spawns biology. Major improvements have been achieved in this field in the past few years 21 . Organic chemistry and chemical evolution are clearly central to this integrated understanding.

Habitability and the limits of life—topic B

Study of life on Earth has shown the astounding ability of living systems to adapt to the most extreme and improbable environments on Earth (withstanding extremes in temperature, pressure, pH, humidity, salinity, radiation dose, and oxidation) 22 , 23 . In fact, the majority of terrestrial environments are inhabited by multiple domains of life. The emergence of life on Earth under environmental conditions very different to those reigning today, and the tremendous capacity of life to adapt to and even prosper under conditions that we would consider “extreme”, provide perspective for the search for life elsewhere in the Solar System, and broaden the scope of what the term “habitable” can mean.

Many inhabited extreme environments on Earth combine several parameters that are considered (from a human perspective) to be extreme in themselves. The resistance of a given organism to environmental extremes (either naturally occurring or artificial), and how these potential stress-inducing parameters influence its overall response, is an important avenue of research. Some studies of the effects of individual and combined extreme environments can be performed at appropriate field sites on Earth or using simulated environmental parameters in the laboratory 24 . However, to truly examine the combination of effects induced by the complex space environment, space experiments are a necessity. As such, ground and space-based approaches should be seen as complementary to maximize scientific return. Our improved understanding of characteristics, mechanisms of adaptation, and resistance of astrobiologically relevant and extremophilic organisms to space conditions is critical in understanding the biological effects of the space environment. Such studies are needed to define habitability (for life as we know it) and to support space exploration and the search for life beyond our planet. This includes continued protection of humans in space, as well as protecting the Earth, other planets and moons as human space exploration progresses.

Despite the broad range of physically and chemically extreme environments naturally present on Earth, some extraterrestrial conditions are specific to space, planetary, or planetary satellite environments. These conditions include low pressure down to space vacuum, exceptionally low relative humidity, micro- and fractional gravities, or parameters that may mimic the early Earth environment (anoxic, high radiation, warmer temperatures). Moreover, the Earth’s present magnetic field and atmosphere attenuate the far higher doses of ionizing and short-wavelength solar ultraviolet (UV) radiation that exist in space or on the surfaces of some other solar system bodies. It is possible to mimic single components of space radiation on Earth, but, due to its complexity, the radiation field in space can only partly be simulated 25 , 26 . Access to space environments is necessary in order to perform in situ exposure of organisms and their component macromolecules (nucleic acids, carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, etc.). This allows for the measurement of space-radiation-induced metabolic, genetic, and phenotypic changes, as well as the survival of, or damage to, key biomolecules. When investigating the constraints of life beyond Earth, such space-based experiments are critical in identifying individual or combined physically extreme parameters, that cannot be found or simulated on Earth.

Terrestrial organisms typically form groups and communities that provide advantages for survival and adaptation to environmental conditions. Single organisms may not be able to cope with extreme environmental parameters; however, biological interactions may provide collective protection, thus protecting many individuals. Adaptation to large environmental changes on a planetary scale (such as those that occurred on Mars 27 ) may be mitigated on the micro-scale in environmental niches by associations of organisms of either the same or different species (dual/multi-species biofilms, symbionts, ecosystems 23 , 28 , 29 ), and their interactions with abiotic material (rock/regolith layers, etc.). Investigating survival and adaptation strategies based on community formation and symbiotic relationships is important to understanding the limits of habitability.

As there is an increasing number of organisms being discovered and described that show adaptations to extreme environments 30 , 31 , it is essential to determine if these novel extremophiles imply that life could be distributed (either naturally or artificially) through the Solar System. There is a possibility that organisms could travel to and survive within interplanetary meteorites (e.g., those ejected from Mars to Earth); the mineral protection and preservation of organisms or biomolecules under these relevant environments is important. In addition to the natural distribution of life in the Solar System, we must assume that space exploration could result in forward contamination of solar system bodies by terrestrial material. This further underlines the need for Earth orbit and space-based in situ experiments, focusing on the survival strategies of organisms and their means of adaptation to environmental parameters not found on Earth. Knowledge of these survival strategies and the limits of extremophilic organisms will lead to further developments and improvements of decontamination procedures in a context of planetary protection. Currently, such decontamination procedures are the only way to minimize the risk of contamination of other worlds with terrestrial life. This is of particular importance for destinations that are considered habitable and may have (developed) their own biota. The investigation of viable spacecraft microbiota (both external and internal) will support more targeted, destination-dependent planetary protection measures. The potential impact and likelihood of forward biocontamination by both robotic and human missions must be considered very carefully, both at the technical and operational level, particularly assessing their compatibility with life-detection missions.

The signs of life—topic C

To understand the signs of life (biosignatures) in and beyond our solar system, we must focus on cells, their remnants, clearly cell-related biochemical molecules, as well as biomediated structures. In addition, studying environmental transformations (including potential bio-driven transformations of atmospheric composition) should be an important objective. This topic focuses on detecting signs of life using a suite of complementary instruments, on the characterization of distinct cellular components and the stability of these biomolecules, as well as any specific physical evidence of interaction of cells with their environment. This is particularly relevant for in situ missions searching for evidence of life, as well as for analysis of returned extraterrestrial samples.

The search for signs of extinct life (either biomineralized or fossilized) relies on detecting organic, geochemical, isotopic or morphological remnants or other biomediated phenomena, such as biolaminae or stromatolitic bioconstructions 32 , at, or within planetary subsurfaces or ices. A better understanding of the process of fossilization and how extant biosignatures are preserved over geological time is required 33 . A relevant example of this is the search for past life on Mars. UV radiation interactions with organic remnants under different atmospheres, temperatures, pressures, and humidities needs to be investigated using references, such as terrestrial fossils from Earth. This can be performed under simulated conditions (planetary-simulation facilities 34 ), however space-exposure facilities provide access to environmental parameters not available on Earth, such as microgravity, full-spectrum solar and cosmic radiation. Such experiments can provide insights into early-Earth conditions similar to those expected on rocky planets (such as Mars or Venus) or exoplanets.

Looking beyond our solar system, the simulation of potential exoplanetary conditions is crucial to decoding spectral signatures and therefore to understanding and interpreting their formation and evolution. Space-based experiments are of particular importance when assessing the impact of the solar spectrum and cosmic rays on biological compounds and organisms as fully representative photon and particle spectra cannot be reproduced in the laboratory. As molecules produced by life forms might not be unambiguously identified, this is a particular challenge for remote detection in (exo)planetary atmospheres or surfaces. Therefore, it is paramount to understand transformational processes and biochemical pathways of biosignatures, especially those that can be detected as volatile organic compounds or gaseous biosignatures in a planetary atmosphere. Also, with the various types, ages and sizes of stars, different planets receive different stellar spectra of electromagnetic radiation. Therefore, to identify signals of potential pigmented life forms on exoplanets, potential biochemical pathways of ultraviolet-visible (UV–vis) absorbing complex organic molecules synthesized in response to spectra different than that of the Sun should be investigated.

In the search for extant life, it is important to analyze biomolecules that can serve as cellular constituents. These include amino acids, peptides, lipids, pigments, and carbohydrates. Additional biomolecules of importance are those known from Earth organisms such as sterols, quinones, and porphyrins, as well as polymeric biomolecules that can store and transfer information, e.g., genetic material and proteins. With the assumption that non-Earth life is similar to life as we know it (i.e., based on carbon-bearing molecules with water as a solvent), it is possible to characterize cellular life cycles based on the presence, amount, or change over time of potential biomarker molecules on a planetary surface or atmosphere. In addition to environmental processes influencing biomarker molecules, the converse may also be true, with cellular processes having the potential to influence their surroundings. Such a reciprocal influence must be accounted for when classifying biosignatures or identifying extant life in a space or planetary environment.

A systematic approach for the detection of microbial life forms can be based in part upon the collection of data from the known microbial world. Environmental parameters and the geological evolution of potential host planets or planetary bodies should determine their viability as search targets. For instance, life-detection missions to Mars and to the moons Europa and Enceladus will include means to seek signatures of microorganisms similar to terrestrial life forms with metabolisms that could have been present on early Earth (including chemotrophs/anoxygenic photosynthesizers/certain heterotrophs 35 ). Similar evidence-based considerations are needed to tailor missions to other bodies in our solar system. Furthermore, studies are needed to understand the relationship between the signs of life and various environmental conditions present at planetary-analog field sites, during planetary-simulation experiments, as well as in space. Each of these environmental parameters could alter or hide biosignatures, or produce false positives, such a minerals or organomineral structures that imitate the relatively simple morphology of microorganisms. These approaches should not only account for biosignatures derived from “life as we know it” but should also include agnostic biosignatures, i.e., signs of chemical or geological disequilibrium. As such, a variety of detection instruments and analytical techniques should be utilized to systematically add to existing databases such as NASA’s Astrobiology Habitable Environments Database. The integration and synchronization of centralized spaceflight experimental data repositories is a necessity in the future.

Space platforms for astrobiology and astrochemistry

Why space experiments.

Space provides a unique environment for performing astrobiology and astrochemistry experiments. Ground-based research is useful for studying the impact of environmental factors on the origin and evolution of life on Earth, and typically provides access to standardized reproducible conditions allowing quick repetitions of experiments, larger samples sizes, higher sample numbers, precise control of physicochemical parameters and an increase in the variety and resolution of analytical techniques at typically lower cost, when compared to space-based experiments. However, ground-based research can currently only be used for assessing single (or a limited sub-set of) space-based environmental factors, and as such provides only limited information on the combined influence of these factors. Experiments performed in space allow the study of effects induced by microgravity, by the wide spectrum of photons and energetically charged particles, as well as their combined effects on samples to be studied. To gather a complete and robust picture of influence of the space environment, a complementary approach must be utilized, exploiting the strengths of both in situ experimentation and ground-based research.

Within the context of searching for signs of life, the rationale for missions with the aim of visiting other celestial bodies (e.g., Mars) is mostly self-evident; however, remote-sensing platforms must also be tested and implemented. In addition, space-based experiments that focus on cellular life cycles, adaptation, biomineralization and fossilization processes must often be complemented by diverse ground-based experiments.

Commonalities and properties of existing and planned platforms have to be identified to better define the experimental requirements and limitations of specific space platforms, and their suitability for astrobiology and astrochemistry experiments must be assessed. With this assessment, it is possible to decide how best to utilize space experiments to address key astrobiology and astrochemistry topics. Figure 2 illustrates potential locations for a number of space platforms, their distance from Earth and the potential range of mission durations. The distance from Earth and the mission duration give an initial indication of the possibilities of these platforms and are important characteristics for various astrobiology and astrochemistry experiments. For example, distance and duration are correlated with the type and amount of radiation that targets would receive.

Space exposure experiments require suitable platforms for providing levels of radiation and microgravity. Platform location dictates mission duration, radiation exposure, the potential for sample return and the necessity of in situ measurements. As the distance from Earth increases, different radiation environments become available at the cost of increasingly challenging sample return.

Why experiments in specific orbits/locations?

Space-based experiments in certain low Earth orbits (LEOs), or on the Moon and Mars, allow access to higher fluxes of high-energy photons, galactic cosmic rays and solar energetic particles compared to the terrestrial environment. Specific locations, however, can have vastly different radiation levels. For example, the Moon receives a very high radiation dose whereas the level on Mars is lower due to its thin atmosphere. To constrain radiation-driven processes and examine their effects on biology, simultaneous ground-based and space experiments are needed. An advantage of space experiments, especially in the field of astrochemistry, is that platforms can be designed and operated far from sources of terrestrial or artificial contamination (e.g., atmospheric pollution, outgassing events from larger platforms, vibrations and electromagnetic interferences). Similarly, remote-sensing methods that use telescope optics to collect spectral data in the near-infrared (IR) to radio wavelength ranges, as well as visible and UV, function most optimally beyond the Earth’s atmosphere.

Within the context of finding signs of life in our own solar system, it is clear that sending probes to planets and moons of interest is the most efficient way to search for signatures of extant or extinct life. The nature of these missions is highly dependent on the environment of the world under investigation. For example, in the case of Europa, current projects are solely orbital, relying on remote-sensing techniques as well as encountering ejecta from the surface of the moon itself 36 , 37 , even though mission proposals for in situ investigations are discussed. On the other hand, previous, current and future missions to Mars and Titan include significant landing modules to study the surface directly 38 , 39 . A special case, Saturn’s moon Enceladus ejects ice particles from its subsurface ocean into space via south polar “cryovolcanoes”, providing fly-by missions the opportunity to examine recently frozen water for life’s signatures 40 .

How long would the mission duration need to be?

In order for large-scale space-based facilities (e.g., the ISS, the James Webb Space Telescope, or the planned PLATO spacecraft 41 ) to make fiscal sense, their lifetimes must be typically on the order of decades. However, the advent of SmallSats and CubeSats (e.g., O/OREOS 42 , SpectroCube 7 , IR-COASTER 5 , BioSentinel 8 , 9 ) are currently challenging this assumption. Short-term exposure experiments (e.g., BIOPAN 43 ) should be used as predecessors or viability assessments for long-term exposure experiments, and small-scale missions (e.g., Twinkle 44 , CUTE 45 ) should be used to support multi-decade lifespan spacecraft. This implies that miniaturization of existing technology is of the utmost importance.

The study of photochemical processes and reaction pathways typically requires several months of radiation exposure in, for example, LEO to accrue a total radiation dose that produce measurable effects, leading to overall mission times on the order of one year. Similarly, radiation-biological effects on some extremophilic microorganisms require months of exposure to accumulate. However, this must be assessed based on the tolerances of the organism under investigation, as well as the specific location of the experimental platform. Finally, to assess the long-term, cumulative effects and adaptations to space radiation, radiotolerant and extremophilic organisms (and organisms with resistant forms, e.g., spores) should be exposed for long durations. The importance of time taken to reach a destination becomes even more important for missions further afield, such as to Mars or the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. In these cases, there is a minimum mission duration ranging from months to a decade or more with current propulsion technologies.

What mode of operation is required?

In the past, space-exposure platforms have relied on sample-return experiments (e.g., the Long-Duration Exposure Facility 46 , EURECA, EXPOSE-E, EXPOSE-R, EXPOSE-R2 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 ), and while such methods provided access to the LEO environment, the lack of time-resolved data was a major limit to the conclusions that could be drawn. The collection of data during space missions is highly desirable for future space experiments. Such in situ analyses are an important way of adding redundancy and reducing the risks of space missions, while at the same time providing a more detailed, comprehensive data set compared to experiments relying solely on pre/post-flight analysis.

When designing future space facilities, organic compounds of prebiotic interest, cellular and molecular biosignatures, as well as both the fossilized remains and live microorganisms should be studied under plausible space and planetary conditions, with variable but known and controlled radiation, pressure, and temperature parameters 51 . To investigate a wide range of environmental parameters, space-based experimental facilities should implement dynamic humidity levels, wet/dry cycling and freeze/thaw cycles with the possibility of real-time analyses to follow any changes encountered. New facilities should allow for in situ thermal control and the possibility to simulate cool planets (e.g., N 2 cooling cycles), icy moons, comets, and interstellar-medium conditions (e.g., He cooling).

For experiments involving living organisms, multiple generations of live, metabolically active organisms should be exposed via small payloads that implement fine temperature control, relative humidity, pressure, pH, atmospheric composition, nutrient/reagent supply, and the removal of waste products (liquids and gases). Bioreactors and microevolution chambers require further development and optimization, for instance microfluidic systems can implement fine control of a variety of environmental parameters. Microwells, each with independent fluidic inlets and outlets, can be utilized for a large number of low-volume microbial growth experiments, operated in parallel 52 . Experiments with living systems (such as NASA’s BRIC 53 , BioCell Habitat 54 ) require automatic assay, often including subsampling at regular intervals, in situ telemonitoring (observing the appropriate functions, e.g., metabolism, genetic transcription and translation, self-repair mechanisms and quantification of adaptions), and the capacity for adjustments to be made via telecommand.

Although in situ analysis is currently the most effective means to acquire data from interplanetary probes, sample return or (ex situ) lab analogs are highly informative and complementary to such in situ analyses. To learn the most from in situ biological experiments conducted in space or planetary environments, following exposure, it is highly desirable to preserve and return samples to Earth for in-depth, laboratory-based studies. Of particular interest is the genomic, proteomic, transcriptomic & metabolomic influence of the space environment. This will require standardization of experimental protocols for selected, well-studied model organisms of interest, allowing gathered in space to be compared between experiments data.

In general, analytical techniques should have a dual function: on the one hand, to give extensive information on the processes at work, and on the other hand, to allow comparison with astronomical data and data from space missions 38 , 55 . In addition to experiments focusing on the exposure of samples to the space environment, methods must be designed to process and handle samples returned from space missions, with particular emphasis on planetary protection and life detection. In this regard, space platforms with frequent access (e.g., ISS) are ideal to test sample-return scenarios for interplanetary missions (e.g., Mars).

Which (in situ) analyses are foreseen?

While several biological methods and technologies have recently been adapted to space conditions with operation by human crew (e.g., DNA extractions 56 , the FLUMIAS live cell imaging microscope 57 , and RT-PCR instruments 58 ), to fully understand the scope and details of the impacts of extended durations in the space environment upon terrestrial organisms, it is imperative to continue advancing space-compatible cellular analytical techniques, such as qPCR 58 , high-throughput sequencing, fluorescence-activated cell sorting 59 or sub-cellular microscopic techniques. In addition to studies of monocultures of extremophilic microbes, biological interactions, such as biofilms, symbionts or microbial communities may result in increased resistance to the environmental stressors of space. As such, focus should be placed on understanding how a given biological interaction influences survivability and adaptation, along with the identification of keystone species that are particularly influential. For a detailed analysis of such community samples, both in situ and postexposure analyses (with instrumentation not available for in-flight measurements) are typically required.

In order for landed missions, such as the Mars surface rovers ( mars.nasa.gov/msl/ , mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/ ) to aqcuire evidence that could point to (extant or extinct) extraterrestrial life and to more generally understand the organic chemical history of other bodies in our solar system, they require sophisiticated in situ measurement and data analysis capabilities. Samples such as rock cores can be examined in both a geological context and in the search for organic molecules, having the potential to provide information on the decay of biomarker molecules or life cycle processes. To obtain such information, landers and rovers use a range of observational techniques (surface imaging via radar, cameras and microscopes) in combination with various in situ spectroscopic and spectrometric methods. Gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS) is a cornerstone in situ analytical technique for landers 60 and is currently the only way to detect enantiomeric excess of chiral molecules in situ 61 . Prominent examples of its use on Mars include the Viking missions of the mid 1970s 62 and the Mars Science Lander 63 that continues to operate on the Martian surface. Sample mapping and composition analysis is commonly performed using a variety of spectroscopic techniques, including UV–vis absorption and UV–vis fluorescence measurements, transmission and reflection Fourier-transform IR microscopy, Raman, Mössbauer, X-ray diffraction and X-ray fluorescence, and laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy 7 , 42 , 64 , 65 , 66 . Other useful techniques for analyzing both organic and inorganic species, currently being miniaturized for in situ use include laser ablation and laser ablation ionization mass spectrometry 67 , 68 .

The current technologies outlined above are being utilized for specific selection of candidate samples, which can later be returned to Earth for more detailed study (e.g., the current Mars Sample Return campaign 69 ). However, looking to the future, more advanced in situ techniques could be miniaturized and implemented, potentially alleviating the need for sample return and thus reducing overall mission complexity and cost. For example, in situ MS is a very relevant analytical technique, recently used by the Mars Science Laboratory 70 to analyze gases and sublimated species released by thermal means. However, heating a sample to high temperatures may release volatile organic species that can trigger chemical reactions or the degradation of potential biomarkers. As such, new technologies are being developed to extract soluble organics from solid (irradiated) samples at mild temperatures using solvent-based techniques, without degradation 71 ; following such extraction, various high-resolution MS and tandem-MS techniques can be employed to understand the nature and provenance of the organic signatures by measuring structural information as well as the extent of the “decay” (alteration over time) of molecular structures.

Which platform would be best suited?

The launch and maintenance of large-scale space platforms (such as space-based telescopes or manned platforms) require huge, dedicated, often multinational, space agency missions. The ISS remains an important exposure platform for both short- and long-term experiments, with the possibility for sample return. Furthermore, the ISS can be utilized as a test platform for future developments and the technological heritage from the ISS can be re-utilized on other platforms. The Lunar Gateway is progressing toward hosting such experiments in the Moon’s vicinity in a matter of years; nonetheless, nanosatellites, CubeSats, and SmallSats are becoming increasingly robust and readily available. They have proved capable of providing complementary information and thus are opening the field of study in this regard (e.g., Pandora 72 ). SmallSats allow for studies ranging from the time-dependent alteration of molecules exposed to particle and electromagnetic radiation, to mimicking conditions on small bodies, to studies of the impact of the space environment on organics in meteorites, and they are showing that astrochemistry exposure experiments can be done outside of traditional platforms such as the ISS. These platforms are potentially also well suited for space biology experiments that expose living organisms over multiple generations to microgravity in combination with levels and distributions of energetic particle radiation only available beyond LEO. To execute such studies effectively the experimental durations aboard these small platforms need to be extended to (many) months to accumulate total radiation dosage with measurable biological effects. As mentioned previously, the continued development of highly sensitive and sophisticated autonomous bioanalytical systems with potential to measure genetic parameters, -omics, and other key biological properties is required.

Nevertheless, life-detection experiments requiring surface landers continue to require costly, dedicated missions. For a lander to make an unambiguous set of measurements that either support or refute a finding of the presence of life on another world, multiple complementary and synergistic analytical methods will most likely be required. As such, larger-scale platforms (relative to CubeSats and SmallSats) are required in this scenario, first to allow for landing, and second to house the required suite of sophisticated analytical tools that are typically too bulky for small platforms. A drawback of SmallSats is the lack of sample-return capabilities in most cases, which is necessary to investigate a variety of cellular effects on ground with a suite of sophisticated instruments not (yet) available in and beyond LEO.

Living metabolically active organisms, cellular processes or community composition may be directly influenced by non-Earth gravity (either micro- or hypergravity). Direct, in situ investigations (using exposure platforms) will solve many issues associated with simulated gravity experiments 73 . Similar experiments with high fluxes of galactic cosmic rays and solar particles are required, especially in preparation for human exploration. A main focus of space platforms is the combined influence of microgravity and varying space-radiation conditions. These can be compared against laboratory facilities (clinostat, simulated solar radiation, gamma radiation sources, heavy ion accelerators, electron beam facilities, X-ray sources, etc). Additionally, new space facilities (such as the Lunar Orbital Gateway) will provide a novel environment in which the establishment of a new microbiome can be studied. While a similar capability for a more limited class of experiments is in principle also feasible with SmallSats or CubeSats, the Lunar Orbital Gateway will be distinct, given the limited human presence and potential for long-term monitoring. A “clean” and isolated environment such as this is unique, and thus monitoring of the microbiome over time could provide valuable insights and important information for future habitats on the Moon or Mars.

In addition to focusing on changes induced by the space environment, experiments to determine the transformative effects from the process of re-entry have also been performed 6 , 74 , 75 . Samples such as Martian sedimentary rocks containing organic material have been placed in the heat shield of craft returning from LEO, subjecting them to extreme temperatures and a high-velocity plasma environment that is incredibly challenging to replicate ex situ. The survivability of organisms and/or the degradation of biomolecules should be assessed under the extreme pressure and temperature conditions of atmospheric re-entry and surface impact. Such experiments should be conducted on platforms (e.g., STONE 76 , 77 ), re-entry nanosatellites, or as external additions on larger returning spacecraft. The potentially protective influence of rocky body-associated minerals must also be accounted for. With regard to both forward (contamination from Earth carried to other bodies) and reverse (extraterrestrial organisms brought back to Earth) planetary protection, both internal and external biocontamination must be assessed at the molecular level; a process that is also mandatory for search-for-life missions in order to eliminate serious risk of false positives.

Recommended space-exposure payloads: short and medium term

The key questions in each of the topics presented in the introduction of this perspective can be addressed by specific space experiments on either multi-experiment space-exposure facilities or by means of tailored space platforms. Short (next 3 years) and medium (next 5 years) term recommendations for experiments in the key area A, “understanding the origins of life” include the design and implementation of experiments with active analytical capabilities (e.g., in situ spectroscopy and mass spectrometry) and active environmental control. In particular, platforms capable of maintaining sample temperatures well below 0 °C, ideally even at temperatures as low as <100 K, are required for a next generation of astrochemistry experiments and investigations of ice-organics mixtures, icy-moon, and interstellar-medium conditions. A further recommendation is to perform such experiments in locations with minimal terrestrial pollution, for example avoiding outgassing events from larger facilities such as the ISS. In addition to exposure experiments, platforms designed for re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere are recommended to advance our understanding of meteoritic impact processes. Such platforms should be capable of carrying and analyzing samples either in situ or after hardware retrieval.

In key area B, “understanding habitability and the limits of life”, recommended experiments and platforms should focus on the impact of the space environment on living (micro)organisms, in particular, the combination of radiation and microgravity. Paired with in situ analytical capabilities, these experiments should study the response and adaptation of living systems to multiple stresses that can be monitored directly in space. This will likely require microfluidic and liquid-handling systems that function reliably in space. In addition to in situ data, sample return for in-detail analysis after the space-exposure phase is highly desirable. Re-entry platforms are recommended for the study of impact scenarios and how they affect either actively-growing or dormant living organisms.

With the focus of key area C, “understanding the signs of life”, being on detectability and identification of potential biosignatures, experiments in this area must be capable of simulating space and planetary conditions, including the respective radiation environment (electromagnetic and particle radiation). This can be achieved by designing and implementing space-exposure platforms that can access specific radiation environments, e.g., low- or highly elliptical orbits around Earth, the moon or interplanetary platforms. In situ analysis will be a key tool for such experiments investigating the stability or alteration of specific biosignatures (in the solid or gas phase) under conditions mimicking space and (exo)planetary conditions.

Future outlook and summary

We live in exciting times for space sciences and space exploration with an unprecedented number of missions in the implementation or planning phases. Driven by commercialization and reduced launch and development costs, the progress in space technology, miniaturization and automation offers new possibilities for experiments in space environments and enables the design and implementation of new space-exposure platforms. With the advent of artificial intelligence, machine learning and robotics, performing more complex scientific experiments beyond Earth is becoming increasingly feasible and enables addressing important questions in the fields of astrobiology and astrochemistry, highlighted in the introduction to this perspective. Astrobiology experiments with live cells require sophisticated fluidic systems and in situ analytics and are key to advancing our understanding of the limits of life on and beyond Earth (topic A). The space environment, for the exposure of samples to early Earth or other simulated planetary conditions, is an excellent tool for addressing questions in relation to the origin and evolution of life, including prebiotic chemistry (topic B). Astrochemistry aims to investigate processes and conditions not necessarily found on Earth and difficult to simulate in terrestrial laboratories. While ground experiments can provide a cost-effective means to acquire preliminary data in preparation for space experiments, having access to space environments via the space platforms discussed is critical to perform astrochemistry experiments in their native environments thus allowing the simulation of important astrophysical, astrochemical and planetary conditions more faithfully than Earth-based facilities. This will be crucial for understanding the formation of organic molecules as well as potential biosignatures, and in support of current and upcoming life-detection missions to planetary and lunar bodies in our solar system (topic C). Beyond the solar system, and in the rapidly expanding field of exoplanetary sciences, new space platforms and telescopes play a pivotal role in understanding planetary habitability and possibly detecting signs of life, which has the potential to revolutionize our understanding of life in the universe.

Reporting summary

Further information on research design is available in the Nature Research Reporting Summary linked to this article.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Topical Team Astrobiology/Astrochemistry, and was partially funded by ESA grant # 4000136280/21/NL/KML/rk (J.v.L.), ANR grant # ANR-21-CE49-0017-01_ACT (A.K.), Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi)/Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) grants 50WB1623 and 50WB2023 (A.E. and D.B.), Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) grant 490702919 (A.E.), Einstein Foundation grant IPF-2018-469 (A.E. and R.G.U.), Volkswagen Foundation and its Freigeist Program (A.E. and P.M.), DFG grant 426601242 project RaBioFAM (J.P.d.V.), BMWi grant 50WB1152 (J.P.d.V.), CSC acknowledges support from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) grant ST/V000586/1.

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Elsaesser, A., Burr, D.J., Mabey, P. et al. Future space experiment platforms for astrobiology and astrochemistry research. npj Microgravity 9 , 43 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41526-023-00292-1

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The health benefits and business potential of digital therapeutics

Around the world, the burden of chronic disease is increasing at a rapid pace. Unfortunately, most of these conditions are irreversible and need to be managed through lifelong medication use. However, many patients struggle with adhering to prescribed medications and implementing the behavioral and lifestyle changes that are needed to manage their diseases and stabilize their conditions. Often, physicians and other healthcare providers have little ability to monitor the extent to which patients are following their recommendations and maintaining treatment regimens. As a result, disease burdens at a population level are higher than they should be.

These challenges have created a need for compre­hensive disease management solutions that are best enabled by digital technologies. In 2021, global digital health funding grew 79 percent over the previous year to reach $57.2 billion. 1 State of digital health 2021 report , CB Insights, January 20, 2022. Much attention and funding have flowed toward digital therapeutics , which can include multiple points of intervention along the patient journey, including monitoring, medication adherence, behavioral engagement, person­alized coaching, and real-time custom health recommendations. Within digital health, funding for digital therapeutics (including solutions for mental health) has grown at an even faster pace—up 134 percent from the prior year to reach $8.9 billion in 2021. 2 Heather Landi, “Global digital health funding skyrockets to $57.2B with record cash for mental health, telehealth,” Fierce Healthcare,January 21, 2022.

The impact potential here is significant, both in terms of clinical outcomes and economic benefits for stakeholders and societies. For example, research has shown that digital disease management can drive a 45 percent reduction in the three-month rate of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACEs) and a 50 percent reduction in the 30-day readmission rates for patients after acute myocardial infarction (AMI). 3 Jerilyn K. Allen et al., “Digital health intervention in acute myocardial infarction,” Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes , July 15, 2021, Volume 14, Issue 7; Pawel Buszman et al., “Managed care after acute myocardial infarction (MC-AMI) reduces total mortality in 12-month follow-up—results from Poland’s National Health Fund Program of Comprehensive Post-MI Care—A population-wide analysis,” Journal of Clinical Medicine , 2020, Volume 9, Issue 10. Similarly, it can help lower hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) levels by one percentage point among patients with type 2 diabetes. 4 Marcy K. Abner et al., “A novel intervention including individualized nutritional recommendations reduces hemoglobin A1c level, medication use, and weight in type 2 diabetes,” JMIR Diabetes , 2017, Volume 2, Issue 1. These data points illustrate the extent to which digital disease manage­ment can help save lives while also keeping patients healthier, which reduces costs for many stake­holders, including the patients themselves.

Research has shown that digital disease management can drive a 45 percent reduction in the three-month rate of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACEs) and a 50 percent reduction in the 30-day readmission rates for patients.

Many players are trying to disrupt the disease management space and develop new innovative models to manage chronic diseases. New-age start-ups bring radical, unconstrained perspectives, while incumbents contribute a much more detailed understanding of the challenges and various stake­holders. Ultimately, both start-ups and incumbents have critical roles to play in disrupting the space and scaling up solutions.

Digital therapeutics can play an important role in chronic-disease management

The burden of chronic diseases has been increasing globally and is expected to continue. Chronic diseases (such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and respiratory disease) were causes or contributing factors in 75 percent of worldwide deaths in 2010 and 79 percent in 2020. By 2030, experts predict that chronic diseases will contribute to as much as 84 percent of total global mortality (exhibit).

Poor monitoring of and adherence to prescribed medications undermine the management of chronic diseases. According to a 2021 global study, compliance among patients with type 2 diabetes ranges from 69 to 79 percent. 5 Diagnosis-related groups (DRG) treatment data: compliance (medication possession ratio) among patients with type 2 diabetes ranges between 69 to 79 percent for top-20 type 2 diabetes drugs; compliance rates for cancers according to a study on 52,450 patients was 37 percent. Patients were found to be most compliant in the 50- to 59-year-old range (49 percent compliant), with decreased compliance at the extremes of age. See Joseph Blansfield et al., “Analyzing the impact of compliance with national guidelines for pancreatic cancer care using the National Cancer Database,” Journal of Gastrointestinal Surgery , August 2018, Volume 22, Issue 8; Nathan Levitan, “Industry Voices—Here’s how AI is impacting the delivery of cancer care right now,” Fierce Healthcare, June 28, 2019.

Of course, chronic diseases need to be managed not only by medication but also with regular monitoring and lifestyle changes. Hence, providers need better end-to-end solutions that proactively and comprehensively monitor patient health, as well as encourage behavioral changes to improve adherence to prescribed medications, diet, and lifestyles.

Digital technologies can play an important role in improving disease management by tackling these challenges. The potential for digital therapeutics to have a big impact is evidenced by the fact that almost two-thirds of the global population now has internet access.

Research has shown that digital solutions for disease management can drive better outcomes for patients living with chronic diseases. Examples include the following:

• A study of ten thousand patients by the Poland National Health Fund showed a 45 percent reduction in three-month MACE rate and a 40 percent reduction in 12-month mortality rate achieved through managed care after AMI. The study involved cardiac rehabilitation with physician guidance, counseling sessions on lifestyle modification, education on the associated risk factors, therapy, and in-person relaxation sessions. 6 “Managed care after acute myocardial infarction,” 2021.
• A study by the Mayo Clinic in partnership with Healarium showed a reduction in three-month rehospitalizations and emergency department visits of 40 percent for patients following AMI, a weight reduction of 4.0 kilograms, and a 10.8-millimeter reduction in systolic blood pressure. The study involved tracking of vitals, diet, and physical activity, setting reminders and goals, information on current health status, and educational courses for patients. 7 Thomas G. Allison et al., “Digital health intervention as an adjunct to cardiac rehabilitation reduces cardiovascular risk factors and rehospitalizations, Journal of Cardiovascular Translational Research , 2015, Volume 8, Issue 5.
• A US study of more than one thousand patients by Johns Hopkins and Corrie Health showed a 50 percent reduction in the 30-day readmission rate in patients following AMI attained through digital-health-based interventions. The study involved continuous monitoring of vitals with the help of connected devices; educational content on procedures, risk factors, and lifestyle modifications; medication management through reminders and tracking adherence; connection with the care team; mood tracking; and the ability to check the side effects of medication. 8 “Digital health intervention in acute myocardial infarction,” 2021.
• A one percentage-point reduction in HbA1c levels was shown in patients with type 2 diabetes who participated in an online patient community as part of Virta Health’s ten-week nonrandomized parallel arm study with 262 outpatients. The patients were given individualized nutritional recommendations through dedicated health coaches, continuous glucose monitoring kits, and online counseling with doctors. 9 “A novel intervention including individualized nutritional recommendations reduces hemoglobin A1c level,” 2017.

Eight key elements of impactful digital therapeutics solutions

Strong digital therapeutics solutions typically contain most or all of the following eight elements:

• Regular monitoring, measurement, and feedback through connected medical devices . Devices such as smart inhalers for respiratory conditions or continuous glucose monitors for diabetes can provide patients with nudges and alerts for out-of-range readings. For example, Boston-based Biofourmis applies digital therapeutics through the continuous monitoring of connected medical devices. The company offers a doctor-prescribed digital platform approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for patients suffering from chronic heart conditions. Its unique wearable devices offer specialty chronic heart care management, including automated medication management combined with a multidisciplinary remote clinical-care team. In 2022, the company was valued at $1.3 billion.
• Keeping payers and providers in the loop. When patients grant access to their vital statistics, insurance companies, caregivers, and employers can reward them for progress in stabilizing or improving chronic health conditions. For example, Livongo, a program from Teladoc Health, allows patients with diabetes to monitor their condition regularly and send alerts via Bluetooth to an app on their own and their caregiver’s phones if readings exceed normal ranges. Over time, patients enrolled with Livongo have achieved a 0.8 percentage-point drop in HbA1c for diabetics, a 10.0-millimeter hemoglobin drop in blood pressure for patients with hypertension, a 1.8-point drop in body mass index, and a 7.0 percent drop in weight. Livongo allows payers and providers to identify and reward good behavior, as well as deter or penalize poor adherence to health plans prescribed by providers.
• Personalized coaching and support . Patients can connect with specific coaches to obtain a personalized diet and exercise plan tailored to their chronic illnesses. This can be very effective from a therapeutic standpoint. A meta-analysis of digital health interventions on blood pressure management showed that digital counseling alongside antihypertensive medical therapy reduced systolic blood pressure by 50 percent relative to controls. 10 Ella Huszti et al., “Advancing digital health interventions as a clinically applied science for blood pressure reduction: A systematic review and meta-analysis,” Canadian Journal of Cardiology , May 2020, Volume 36, Issue 5. For example, Hinge Health has built a $6.2 billion business that offers wearable sensors combined with personalized exercise therapy and one-on-one health coaching.
• Gamified behavioral modification. Digital therapeutics solutions can include gamified challenges and incentives to track and drive adherence to prescribed diets, lifestyle practices, and medications. For example, Discovery, a South African health insurance company, encourages its members to make healthier choices through its Vitality behavioral change program that combines data analytics with rewards and incentives for healthier lifestyle choices.
• Building a thriving community . An active virtual patient community can drive adherence by challenging and motivating patients to live up to their own health goals. For instance, one study of seven thousand patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, HIV, fibromyalgia, or mood disorders found that nearly 60 percent thought the PatientsLikeMe health network helped give them a better understanding of the side effects of medications. The study also found that nearly a quarter of patients with mood disorders needed less inpatient care thanks to their use of the PatientsLikeMe site. 11 “PatientsLikeMe,” Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, accessed January 2023.
• Health mall. A recent McKinsey survey found that 90 percent of healthcare leaders believe that patients interacting with digital health ecosystems want an integrated journey rather than point experiences or solutions. 12 Stefan Biesdorf, Ulrike Deetjen, and Basel Kayyali, “ Digital health ecosystems: Voices of key healthcare leaders ,” McKinsey, October 12, 2021. Healthcare companies can meet this desire for integration by offering digital health malls that include access to prescribed medications, health supplements, wellness products, and diagnostic tests at the click of a button.
• Patient education . Digital education materials can give patients and their family members information on disease conditions, treatment options, diet, and healthy lifestyle choices. For instance, the Midday app launched by Mayo Clinic and digital health start-up Lisa Health provides support, including educational content, to women experiencing menopause. 13 Tia R. Ford, “Lisa Health launches Midday, an app leveraging AI to personalize the menopause journey, in collaboration with Mayo Clinic,” Mayo Clinic, July 19, 2022.
• Advanced analytics to predict and prevent health events . Organizations are working now to build data algorithms that could identify and predict triggers for healthcare events. They could suggest when to take preventative action or where lifestyle and behavioral changes might forestall adverse events.

How incumbents can thrive in the digital therapeutics space

Digital therapeutics have tremendous potential to reduce disease burdens, deliver better clinical outcomes, help providers make more informed treatment decisions, and improve patients’ lives by offering better ways to manage chronic health conditions. Digital therapeutics also offer incumbents access to new sections of the healthcare value chain and a way to play in the much larger end-to-end healthcare market. Given these opportunities, healthcare and pharma incumbents may wish to explore ways to compete and win in this space.

Incumbents have certain inherent advantages in building digital therapeutics offerings. They already have direct access to patients, plus deep knowledge of the pain points in the disease management journey. They also fully understand the disease science that needs to be integrated into the digital health offering.

Still, incumbents also have some work to do to be competitive in digital therapeutics. To successfully launch and scale an offering, they may need to recruit or upskill employees with skills in product development, design, technology, medicine, data science, and strategic partnerships. Incumbents should plan to spend from three to five years building their digital capabilities and inculcating their new digital workforce with the culture, vision, mission, and values to compete successfully against nimble start-ups.

Incumbents that move quickly still have an opportunity to gain a first-mover advantage in the growing digital therapeutics sector, where promising start-ups can receive multibillion-dollar valuations. By developing their own digital therapeutics offerings, incumbents may also find themselves in a stronger position to protect their core businesses from being disrupted by others.

Chirag Adatia is a partner in McKinsey’s Gurugram office, where Samarth Shah is a consultant. Ralf Dreischmeier  is a senior partner in the London office.  Kirtika Sharma is a partner in the Mumbai office.

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Jefferies’ Peter Abramowitz on Positioning Office Assets to Capture Market Share

Peter Abramowitz, vice president for equity research at Jefferies LLC, says office REITs that invest in the right assets, position them well, and have the confidence of tenants that they are well-capitalized, will be winners in the current cycle.

Abramowitz says the ability of well-capitalized landlords with good assets to take market share from those that aren’t willing to invest is one of the more encouraging developments in the REIT office sector. “I hate to say that it’s a zero-sum game, but until we’ve gotten through an entire space rationalization cycle, it likely is.”

Broadly speaking, how do fundamentals in the office space look today?

Peter Abramowitz: Fundamentals are still challenging but getting better. Office landlords spent 2023 dealing with the challenge of both structural (less need for office space in the post-COVID world) and cyclical (hesitant tenant decision-making because of macro uncertainty) pressures on leasing demand. The structural pressures will remain; If you think of the typical office lease as eight to 10 years, we’re still only 4.5 years post the start of a transformational event in the office market.

So even as demand recovers from cyclical pressures, we are still only about halfway through the cycle of tenants needing to rationalize space from leases they signed before the pandemic. There will be some offset from obsolete buildings being demolished and taken out of service for alternative uses, but the overall pool of demand is still shrinking. The smart landlords know that and know it’s becoming a game of how you can position your buildings to capture market share.

Do you think we’ve plateaued in terms of office occupancy post pandemic, or could there be further adjustment ahead?

Abramowitz : I think we have plateaued. Readings of physical office occupancy have been stubbornly stuck around roughly 50% since early last year. The normalization of rates has given some leverage back to employers to call employees back into the office, but much of that has played out since early/mid-2022. There may be some pockets for improvement, specifically in the tech sector, but I think companies have largely set their WFH/hybrid policies. Hybrid is here to stay.

What sort of variation are you seeing between different segments of the office REIT segment?

Abramowitz: In terms of fundamentals, trophy space continues to be most sought after, and is the only segment of the market where rents are really growing. Occupancy is tight because there’s limited supply, and that will only become more true given that very limited new construction has broken ground in the last several years. 

Landlords down market that are smart and know how to reposition assets are taking advantage by redeveloping and amenitizing non-trophy buildings to compete. They likely still have to give more concessions than in trophy/new construction buildings, but they can still get net effective rents in some cases that justify their investment.

Looking ahead, are there other themes or developments in the office space that you see playing an important role?

New industries aiding in the recovery. I think AI will be transformational, and San Francisco always has an ace in the hole in that it is best positioned to capture demand from new technologies that are highly impactful. I think that eventually will help the market recovery, but how long it will take is anyone’s guess.

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