At first a bit disappointed that it wasn't about actual Webb suits, but bolun's link opened my eyes to the benefits of this project.
Quote from: R7 on 01/19/2014 04:40 pmAt first a bit disappointed that it wasn't about actual Webb suits, but bolun's link opened my eyes to the benefits of this project.Basically same people are working on both IVA and EVA suits
Quote from: Dalhousie on 01/20/2014 01:22 amQuote from: R7 on 01/19/2014 04:40 pmAt first a bit disappointed that it wasn't about actual Webb suits, but bolun's link opened my eyes to the benefits of this project.Basically same people are working on both IVA and EVA suitsDoesn't seem that way this is ONLY an IVA suit. This seems aimed at a specific area of controlling the effects of microgravity and not at all for use for EVA or vacuum. Benefits? Sure, lots of them but its not going to help get the MCP suits out of the lab.Randy
It's the first use of MCP technology in space and may reduce the cultural opposition towards it.
The basic principle is the same, even though the purpose and the forces are different. It's the first use of MCP technology in space and may reduce the cultural opposition towards it.
Is there a cultural opposition towards MCP suits?? Something wrong about better mobility and looking good?
For all the talk about MCP, today I learnt that cosmonauts have been using a Lower Body Negative Pressure (LBNP) suit - called "Chibis" to get acclimatised to gravity, starting from a few weeks prior to their return to Earth.This has been used from as far back as Mir!That link, quoting ISS on-orbit reports, mentions four 5 minute stints (while the cosmonaut exercised as if he was on a "stepper"), at gradually "more negative" pressures; and says that the intent was to stimulate the Gauer-Henry reflex (presumably differential stimulation of baroreceptors in the upper and lower half of the body), to "trick" the body into thinking it was in a gravitational field.Maybe MCP isn't needed after all? Or, put a different way, how long would it take for the adverse effects to manifest themselves? Tissue swelling etc.?
Yes, but what I was saying is - given that the cosmonaut's lower bodies didn't suffer any swelling, oedema etc. during use (or else they'd have stopped using Chibis) -- do we actually NEED MCP?How exactly did it work anyway? To not lead to all those problems? Is it perhaps something that happens after adaptation to microgravity? (All the uses have been toward the end of their flights, and not at the beginning). I don't know...skin becoming more rigid or something..?