With US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams set to return to Earth this week, Brock University Associate Professor of Kinesiology Val Fajardo (BSc \u201909, MSc \u201912) says their first steps back on the planet might be a bit rough.<\/p>\n
\u201cRegarding long-duration spaceflight, we know that there will be decrements to musculoskeletal health, including bone and muscle deterioration due to microgravity exposure,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Fajardo is a nationally recognized expert on muscles. As Canada Research Chair in Tissue Remodelling and Plasticity throughout the Lifespan<\/a>, he studies physiological processes that fuel muscle development or decline, including the impacts of exercise and good nutrition on muscle strength.<\/p>\n He and his team have also received samples and\/or funding from NASA<\/a> and the Canadian Space Agency<\/a> to study ways to prevent astronauts from experiencing bone fragility, cognitive decline, and muscle loss and weakness, which occur when spending time in space.<\/p>\n Their research has mainly focused on studying tissue samples from mice that spent time on the International Space Station (ISS), which is where NASA astronauts Wilmore and Williams are stationed.<\/p>\n Fajardo says rodents and humans lose muscle and bone density and strength at a much faster rate in space than they do on Earth because of reduced gravity, which quickly leads to deterioration or atrophy.<\/p>\n The NASA astronauts in question \u2014 who were only intended to be aboard the ISS for eight days \u2014 have been in space for more than nine months.<\/p>\n Fajardo and his teams\u2019 research provides some valuable insight as to what Wilmore and Williams can expect when they disembark the craft.<\/p>\n \u201cThe declines in muscle health and function contribute to a reduction in overall aerobic fitness, which some estimate could be equivalent to decades worth of aging here on Earth,\u201d says Fajardo.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is why exercise is essential in space; however, research has shown that this alone is not sufficient,\u201d he says. \u201cWe need to develop adjuvant therapies if we wish to engage in long-duration spaceflight missions like those to the moon and Mars.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams set to return to Earth this week, Brock University Associate Professor of Kinesiology Val Fajardo says their first steps back on the planet might be a bit rough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":99972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[119,36,3319,4767,1],"tags":[3333,283,11902,423,8480,996,2147,7488,8561,14335,14336,8562,10548,447,3811,13761,6074],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99971"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99971"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100998,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99971\/revisions\/100998"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}