NASA will offer you $18,000 just to sleep

If your bed is your best friend, then NASA might pay you for just having a good friend.

A NASA study is recruiting volunteers to  lie in a bed that is tilted downward at a 6 degree angle for 70 days. Subjects who complete the entire bed rest project can earn up to $18,000.

The study is meant to test the conditions that astronauts might experience while travelling in space. NASA hopes to find out what physical changes occur to scientists on these missions and how much body function is required for a person to complete a specific task. The information will be used to develop methods that allow astronauts to have an easier time physically acclimating to daily life following space exploration.

Since there is no gravity in space, astronauts don’t exert as much effort and might not get the necessary exercise they need to stay in shape.

Researchers are requiring participants to stay on a slight tilt which is intended to allow fluids to move towards the upper part of the body. That would allow researchers to study cardiovascular symptoms similar to what might be experienced during a space expedition.

The volunteers will be required to live in a bed rest facility located in NASA’s Flight Analogs Research Unit (FARU) at the University of Texas Medical branch in Galveston, Texas. The subjects will be split into two groups. Some will be required to spend 105 days living in the facility and go through a variety of resistance and aerobic exercises while remaining on bed rest. The others will spend 97 days, and will not be required to do the exercises.

Data about the subjects’ bones, muscles, heart and circulatory systems, nervous systems, nutritional conditions and their abilities to fight off infections will be recorded.

If they need to shower or use the bathroom, NASA has a modified shower device so the subjects will not need to stand.

For both groups, they’ll have a few days of regular, mobile living inside the facility and a two-week recovery period after their 70 days of bed rest where they will be reconditioned back to normal physical activity.

NASA will pay $1,200 a week for the study which can last up to 15 weeks. The study was vetted and deemed safe by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, a committee which looks at the safety and ethics of medical research studies with human subjects.

Still interested? You must be in shape — another requirement is that participants have to be non-smokers in healthy physical condition who pass the Modified Air Force Class III physical.

The project does come with potential health risks. Dr. Adam Stein, chairman of the dept. of physical medicine and rehabilitation at the North Shore-LIJ Health System in Great Neck, N.Y., told CBSNews.com that he typically sees loss of muscle strength, bone density and respiratory capacity in patients who have extended periods of bed rest. There’s also the danger for developing urinary and constipation problems.

“I would expect after 70 days there would be changes that can’t be made up for and recovered from (right away),” he said, adding that healthy people should be able to recover to their pre-experiment function eventually.

Immobile persons chance getting skin issues like bed sores and pressure sores, especially because many patients lose sensation. But, Stein, who is not involved in the NASA study, said that since these volunteers will be in good health, the risk of getting these particular problems is low.

Source:360 nobs