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Background
Background
We built our project on existing scientific literature that investigates how the human brain adapts to microgravity and microgravity analogs.
Courtesy of NIAID, Ryan Kissinger.
Specifically, we are interested in the vestibular system. This is a loopy organ behind your ear that mechanically detects your body's orientation in space. If you are tilted up or down, spinning left or right.
That is, if there is gravity.
Without gravity, the vestibular system can't function properly and doesn't supply your cognitive centers with coherent information about your orientation. Your brain will try to make sense of this unusual information with the help of visual and proprioceptive cues. But without the 1g gravity your body is used to, things can get messy very fast - which is why we get motion sick.
You can imagine how this would be a problem in space. Astronauts need to be able to rely on their cognition in order to fulfil complex tasks efficiently and under pressure.
Courtesy of NASA.
Therefore, it is important to understand how the brain's functions change in microgravity and what can be done to minimize negative impacts on astronauts' cognition.
Where COMPASSpace comes in
Where COMPASSpace comes in
There is a growing body of research that investigates electrical stimulation of the vestibular nerve with dGVS (disruptive galvanic vestibular stimulation).
This technique can be used for various purposes, for example to disrupt vestibular output and test if it is involved in spatial memory encoding (spoiler alert: it is!)
Our project builds on the knowledge from ground-based research that vestibular output is crucial for encoding spatial memories. We want to be the first research group taking this to parabolic flights, testing spatial memory and vestibular output disruption in real microgravity conditions.
Our research question:
Our research question:
Is spatial memory impaired in microgravity conditions?
To accomplish this, we want to conduct a series of cognitive tests on human subjects during the microgravity phase of parabolic flights.
We will use the 21-second window of centi-milli-gravity levels during each parabola to test participants' spatial memory encoding and retrieval ability.
This will help us understand how spatial memory is affected by microgravity.
What role does the vestibular system play in encoding and retrieval under altered gravity conditions?
The future of COMPASSpace
The future of COMPASSpace
Our research can inform future astronaut safety and efficiency.
Besides understanding the vestibular system, we can inform future research for manipulating vestibular signaling and alleviating disruptions experienced in microgravity.
The results are improved understanding of altered astronaut cognition, potential tools for astronauts to mitigate cognitive deficits in microgravity and informed research of pathological vestibular disruptions on earth.
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