- Artemis II crew returns to Earth after a historic 10-day lunar flyby mission
- Four USB-sized organ chips with bone marrow cells studied human health in space
- Organ chips developed by Harvard's Wyss Institute to assess space radiation risks
On Friday (Apr 10), the Artemis II crew, featuring mission commander Reid Wiseman, NASA's Victor Glover and Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency's Jeremy Hansen, will return to Earth after a historic 10-day journey around the Moon. Returning with them are four tiny, USB-sized, transparent organ chips, each holding their bone marrow cells, that functioned as living tissue models to study human health in space.
The chips are part of the AVATAR programme, which stands for 'A Virtual Astronaut Tissue Analog Response', as NASA attempts to understand the effects of deep-space flight on human biology, particularly the risks of radiation exposure. Developed by the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, these organ chips represent a 'paradigm shift' in how space agencies study human health risks beyond Earth's protective shield.
As per Lisa Carnell, director of NASA's Biological and Physical Sciences Division, the ultimate goal of the experiment is to send avatars of astronauts on deep-space missions ahead of time. This enables the team to prepare for potential health risks before they become an issue, far from home, in deep space.
“In the Apollo days, it was just a few days on the surface. If we're literally going to have people on the surface for a long period of time, even 30 days or longer, I mean, we don't have data on that at all, right?” Carnell told CNN.
“We like to say, ‘Know before we go.' It's that simple. Like, how do we know before we send them to ensure that we bring them back healthy and that they're as safe as can be? And this is such a simple, eloquent way to do that.”
Since this is the first-of-its-kind science experiment, scientists are unsure if the chips will survive the journey and if they do, how closely the chips will mirror what happens in the bodies of the astronauts. All will unravel itself when the chips are recovered from the Orion spacecraft after the splashdown.
Artemis II Splashdown
After a historic lunar flyby, the four astronauts will be returning to Earth on Friday, with the splashdown expected at approximately 8:07 pm EDT (5:37 am IST, April 11) off the coast of California, a similar location to where the uncrewed Artemis I mission landed in December 2022.
The Orion capsule will endure temperatures of up to 2,760 degrees Celsius while re-entering Earth's atmosphere at speeds of up to 38,600 kph, during a rough 13-minute descent. A heat shield will protect the crew as parachutes deploy to slow the capsule before it splashes down in the Pacific Ocean. The astronauts will then be recovered by the USS John Murtha and escorted back to shore.
