There is an aviation term called “death spiral.” This refers to the pilot’s distorted sensory perception that contradicts the accurate readings of the instruments, causing confusion and leading to inappropriate course corrections. As the name suggests, this often has tragic consequences. Many experts believe such problems contributed to his 1999 crash that killed John F. Kennedy Jr. and his 1959 tragedy that caused the deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and Zsa Zsa. thinking about. big bopper. Disorientation was also one of the causes of the 2021 helicopter crash that claimed Kobe Bryant’s life.
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Such a scenario is scary enough on its own, but imagine a similar situation while floating in the vacuum of space. Working in such an environment, with no gravity and few if any reference points, can quickly become disorienting and potentially dangerous, as astronauts lose their sense of direction.
NASA astronauts receive extensive training to prevent spatial disorientation, especially as private companies increasingly expand their own projects in both space tourism and government contracts. This issue remains a major concern. But thanks to a team of researchers, wearable sensors enhanced with vibrotactile feedback may one day help astronauts stay grounded.
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Vivekanand P. Vimal, a research scientist at Brandeis University, said, “Long-duration spaceflight causes many physiological and psychological stressors, making astronauts more susceptible to spatial disorientation.” . Ashton Graybeal Spatial Orientation Instituteis explained in recent profile. “A disoriented astronaut can no longer rely on his internal sensors, which he has relied on his entire life.”
To investigate these questions, Vimal and colleagues conducted a series of trials with 30 participants. The researchers taught 10 of them to treat their vestibular senses (the sense of where they are in space and where they are going) with skepticism. Another 10 volunteers underwent the same training with the addition of a vibrotactor, a device that attaches to the skin and makes sounds depending on geospatial location. Her final 10 participants were given only the vibratory tactor without any training. Subjects were then blindfolded and equipped with earplugs and placed inside a “multi-axis rotation device” (called MARS), which played white noise in the background and intentionally disoriented them.
Similar to an inverted pendulum, MARS first rotated an upright subject from side to side about a central axis, acting as an analogue of everyday gravitational signals on Earth. The subject then used her two joysticks to try to remain stable without swinging to the collision boundary on either side. The second phase included the same parameters, but the cockpit was shifted horizontally (participants faced the ceiling) to better approximate the space environment without Earth’s gravitational reference point. situation). Across 40 trials for each subject, in 20 out of 30 participants, the vibrotactor would emit a beeping sound if the participant moved too far from the central equilibrium point and could wait to correct the position with the joystick. was there.
Vimal, along with co-authors Alexander Sacha Panic, James R. Lackner, and Paul DiZio, published their findings in a new study published Nov. 3. Frontiers in physiology. The researchers found that all participants initially felt disoriented during the analog test due to conflicting inputs from the vestibular system and vibrotactile system. Participants who trained with sensors beforehand performed best during the space phase, while those who only trained without wearables “crashed” more often. This third group of his also ended up being accidentally destabilized more often than his other two groups. However, subjects performed much better when in the earth analogue position, with and without vibrotactor assistance. Bimal’s team suspects that the device was too weak or that participants needed more time to get used to it.
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With further testing and refinement, Bimal’s team believes engineers could incorporate similar wearables into astronaut suits to provide orientation aids both inside the spacecraft and off the space station. They may be small additions, but they are ones that can save investigators from very serious, frightening, and even deadly situations.
