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Study: Immune System Weakens in Space

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New research suggests even brief forays into space can weaken the immune systems of astronauts.

During the final flight of the US space shuttle Atlantis in the summer of 2011, one of the most important pieces of scientific cargo on board was a medical experiment designed to test how the human immune system responds to stress and disease in the microgravity conditions of Earth orbit.

The experiment contained samples of living human cells housed in a sterile, temperature-controlled module. Astronauts pushed a button to infect the cells with a common bacterial toxin that causes sepsis, a severe and potentially lethal skin infection.

The module spent two weeks in space and researchers at the U.S. Army Medical Command have spent the past two years analyzing the data.

They compared that data with the results of a parallel experiment conducted on Earth at the same time, under normal gravity conditions.

The same cell line was used to minimize variation between the two experiments.

“We did a micro-array analysis, where we screen 30,000 to 40,000 genes at a time,” said Rasha Hammamieh, deputy director of the Integrative Systems Biology Program at the Medical Command and lead scientist on the project.

The cell samples that went into space showed a diminished ability to activate a normal immune response, according to Hammamieh.

“This means that the cells are not able to respond to a pathogen anymore,” she said. “For an astronaut, that means that it will be easier to get sick because their immune system is weakening.”

The cells in the space shuttle experiment were so busy dealing with microgravity that they barely put up a fight against infections, said Marti Jett, director of the Integrative Systems Biology Program at the Medical Command.

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