If you couldn’t get a job at NASA, this is the time to try your luck, rather oversleeping capabilities, as the space agency is conducting an unusual experiment to improve the lives of its astronauts.
NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are paying volunteers a handsome stipend of USD 19,000 to lie in bed for two months, Cnet reports. Sounds perfect, right?
The prolonged bed rest is actually a test of psychology and physiology. It is a part of a study into the effects of weightlessness on the human body. It will be conducted by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Germany.
For the project, 12 men and 12 women will spend their days and nights in beds angled downward by six degrees, propped up with their feet at an incline above their heads.
One shoulder will be touching the mattress at all times. Such a position reduces the blood flow to the extremities, similar to the conditions astronauts go through in the space.
For the first time, the researchers will use a short-arm human centrifuge to generate artificial gravity to force blood back in the extremities. There will be two groups for study, out of which one will be spun around in the centrifuge.
Now, the toughest part is getting shortlisting. Participants are required to speak German and be between 24 and 55 in age, and healthy. Once the two months of bed rest is complete, participants will be required to stay an additional 29 days for acclimation and supervised recovery.
