Space the new frontier in the battle against cancer An Australian space medicine researcher is preparing to launch cancer cells into space, after trials on earth show that they can be radically affected in near-zero gravity conditions.
How interesting! I wonder if cancer patients could levitate in a special room instead of having to go through harsh treatments? That would be such a blessing.
I truly hope it works out. But wouldn't it be prohibitively expensive to replicate zero gravity on Earth?
@Bess Barber Most definitely it would be wonderful. "Weightlessness" here on the Earth is not real easy to achieve. I'm picturing those machines which project an air stream upwards at 120+ mph, and folks position themselves flat in the stream, and "float". Here is something similar, though I think it is the inside of an airplane fuselage: There is an article about ways to achieve "zero-gravity" here: https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/5-places-to-reach-zero-gravity-within-earths-pull/
Well, they have the modules used to train astronauts. Probably no more expensive than the treatments being used for cancer now. I guess it would kinda work like those lung machines used for polio patients decades ago.
@Shirley Martin @Bess Barber Yes and no. As Bess points out, cancer treatment is mighty expensive. In order to be able to accommodate tens of thousands of cancer patients in weightlessness would surely be mighty expensive, too. Thus, as is usually the case, those affording it get it, many will not. There remains also the question of how long must the treatment carry on. Frank
Radically affected for me doesn't translate into a cure. I think assuring weightlessness doesn't end up mutating to something worse would be part of the experiment.
@Bob Kirk Right you are! Many things were unknowns before humans began riding around the earth in orbit, or beyond. Many things taken for granted normally change radically when gravity is absent. Effects on the human body can be profound. Fish, too! A goldfish in a bowl of water exposed to no gravity is expulsed out of the water: the bowl must be covered to keep fishy submerged! Frank
Yes, I was wondering how long a patient would have to be in zero gravity for the treatment to be effective. How would it effect on the rest of the body? Still, it's worth following up on.