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> We should be able to answer a lot of questions by raising small mammals on the ISS. I'm very curious on why this has not been done yet (or has it?)
by sylvinus 15y ago
> We should be able to answer a lot of questions by raising small mammals on the ISS.
I'm very curious on why this has not been done yet (or has it?)
- georgieporgie 15y agoMy guess is that it's too messy and too time/resource consuming to do cleanly.
- narag 15y agoAlso the ISS is in microgravity. IIRC Mars has something like half the Earth's. Moon would be a better testbed.
- ceejayoz 15y agoMice are small enough that you could probably simulate Martian gravity with a smallish centrifuge. Plus, if they don't have any developmental problems growing up in zero gravity, you can probably safely assume that 1/3 Earth gravity is going to be OK.
- boneheadmed 15y agoAs an undergrad student, I helped conduct a paste-diet study for NASA. The ideas was that rats who would be aboard the space shuttle would eat a combined meal of rat food mixed with water, thereby solving the problem of little bits of food floating around space compartments. I have assumed since that time that there would be continued experiments regarding animals in space, including the ISS, but I have never followed up on this.