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Dark_Believer t1_jdgrazo wrote

One common issue with most astronauts in zero g is that they tend to lose or lessen their sense of smell and taste. This causes them to crave spicier food more while on the ISS than when on Earth.

Here's an article about the topic

In summary, with blood and fluids not being pulled down by gravity, your head tends to be more full of fluids than normal, and it feels like a mild cold congestion all the time. This doesn't seriously impact your digestion or anything, but is just a minor annoyance. Keeping morale high on stressful missions is important, so having good spicy food in space is still important.

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seanbrockest t1_jdgt1ow wrote

>with blood and fluids not being pulled down by gravity, your head tends to be more full of fluids than normal, and it feels like a mild cold congestion all the time.

I'd be interested in knowing what is the minimum G you need to avoid this. Creating 1G in space via spinning is very problematic, but making .05G would be easy. Would it help?

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Dark_Believer t1_jdgu5pu wrote

This issue isn't fully understood, and would be tough to reproduce outside of space flight. From reports I've read it takes up to a full 24 hours of being in zero G before the effect kicks in. That would be too long to simulate in most experiments on Earth ( such as on parabolic flights which give zero G in bursts of like 30 seconds). Personally I doubt you would need a full 1 G to mitigate this smell and taste issue, but realistically if you were going to use rotational simulated gravity, you would want something closer to a full 1G for the other benefits (such as keeping up bone density and muscle mass).

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Kerwinkle t1_jdgyw1h wrote

Ever wondered why airline meals seem to taste bland? Ask an airline meal chef about loss of taste on passenger flights. I'm sure it's not the same issue as spaceflight but a long haul flight also affects your sense of taste and smell. A good thing when you consider all the farts unleashed during those flights too.

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Cow_Launcher t1_jdhb7fk wrote

The problem with aircraft is that the cabin air is very dry, (bleed air from the engines that has been run through airconditioning packs and is at least partly recycled). This dries out the mucous membranes in the nose, which in turn dulls your sense of smell.

Your sense of taste isn't standalone - it depends heavily on your sense of smell. So with that missing/impaired, food will taste bland or even entirely different to how it does on the ground.

Come to think of it, this may also be a factor in the ISS as well as the congestion problems they have. It would be interesting to know if they have humidifiers on board up there.

::Edit:: Yes they do, sort of! it's the Temperature and Humidity Control (THC) subsystem of the Environmental Control and Life Support System (ECLSS).

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Remcin t1_jdibflm wrote

Has any airline ever tried a humidifier? Seems too simple to not have thought of.

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[deleted] t1_jdidbdm wrote

[removed]

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Remcin t1_jdif0c1 wrote

The corrosion was my thought as well. The other reasons make sense to me as well. And go figure the private flights have figured it out haha.

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hawkwings t1_jdho1vv wrote

0.1 G would cause dirt and water to go down to the floor. That might make cleaning easier.

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ChemicalRain5513 t1_jdgvszx wrote

Wouldn't patients lying flat in bed all day experience a similar issue?

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auraseer t1_jdh29c4 wrote

Only very slightly. I read a study on this, and they found that the effect is almost too small to measure, affecting only odors that were barely perceptible in the first place.

This might be because it's nearly impossible for a person to be truly flat and immobile for long enough. They'll turn their head, lift it sightly from the pillow, etc., and even small shifts like that would affect fluid movements.

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joanzen t1_jdnxf4b wrote

Reading up on how quadriplegics cope with a lack of body movement while still eating whole foods is quite interesting.

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Immortal_Tuttle t1_jdh8uuo wrote

What about the Moon? Did astronauts there experienced such symptoms or not?

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reboot-your-computer t1_jdhghmx wrote

If they did, it was probably due to the exposure to 0G for a few days before even getting there. The moon has gravity so we could assume that would prevent such things from occurring. A question this brings me to is how long does it take to fully regain those senses? Would the short time on the moon under some amount of gravity bring the senses right back or does it take time? On top of that, was this an effect we even understood when we were still putting people on the moon or was that too short of a time to really observe this?

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Immortal_Tuttle t1_jdhnxw3 wrote

That's what I wonder if anyone did any research while they were on the surface of the Moon or were they just too busy keeping astronauts alive :)

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reboot-your-computer t1_jdhoa5v wrote

I’d guess they were quite focused on the mission, but there could have been observations made about this issue regardless.

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zekromNLR t1_jdgxrpk wrote

We just don't know. There are no facilities that can produce extended hypogravity to study those longer-term effects. Honestly I think that would be as good a reason as any to construct a spin-gravity space station capable of up to 1 g: Conduct a study to see how much gravity is required for humans to stay healthy. Because if we are going to make permanent settlements on the Moon or on Mars, I think we should probably figure out beforehand if a third or a sixth of Earth's gravity is enough for humans.

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seanbrockest t1_jdgyukp wrote

Longest stay on the moon was 75 hours, anybody know if they mentioned their sinus clearing during that time?

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spuldup t1_jdh66dc wrote

Having good spicy food in space would unlock the final achievement in my life.

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[deleted] t1_jdh8ojh wrote

[removed]

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S0litaire t1_jdhcz50 wrote

yeah, that's what happened in Skylab1.
The spider food got loose that the crew said F!-that, let it burn up in re-entry!

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