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the expedition 40 astronauts going to be

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doing a multitude of experiments during

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their time on board the international

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space station here to talk about some of

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the experiments that they're going to be

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doing is related to biological studies i

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have dr scott smith he's the manager of

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nutritional biochemistry here at johnson

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space center so dr smith first off

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thanks for joining me today now may is

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osteoporosis awareness month so i want

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to focus on bones today now

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we all know that our bodies you know

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they're very great at adapting to new

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environments and they change quite a bit

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in space what are some of the

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experiments that you guys are doing

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related to bone study okay well first of

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all thanks for having me here it's it's

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great to get to talk about some of the

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stuff

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that we're doing back in the lab

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we actually have

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we have a few experiments going on

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onboard station these days

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one of them that is is active right now

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is what we call the biochemical profile

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experiment

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and

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that involves the crew collecting

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biological samples that allow us to see

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how their bones are adapting to space

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flight

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now we you know everybody's used to

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x-rays that you can take and obviously

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we don't have an x-ray machine on orbit

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and what these samples allow us to do is

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to see what's happening with bone

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during flight

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and one of the more striking findings

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that we've we've come across recently

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is that you know we've known for for

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some time now that astronauts lose bone

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during flight

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with the resistive exercise protocols

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essentially the weight lifting if you

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will protocols

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that the crew members perform on orbit

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what we've shown recently is that those

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protocols in crew members that are

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eating well getting enough calories

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have good vitamin d status

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that when they exercise hard that we can

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actually help maintain

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the density of their bones uh during

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spaceflight so really one of the

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countermeasures that we've really

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focused on in these past few years has

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been exercise and nutrition that's

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correct it's a combination that's

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correct and and it it really does take

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both of those things

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um and i would say we focused on

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exercise for a long time i mean if you

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go back to

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skylab those crews had some exercise

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available

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it was only recently though that we flew

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a device that we call the a red

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which is the advanced resistive exercise

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device which allows crews

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to to essentially again lift enough

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weight

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um to

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signal the bones that they need to be

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there

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otherwise what happens in flight is the

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body

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realizes that

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you're not using your bones and

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you know i always say your body does

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what you pay it for so if you're not

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walking around if you're not carrying

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things if you don't have that mass

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pushing on the body your bone says your

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body says well i don't need this

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skeleton let's make a lighter one that

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we can use up here and that can be a

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bit of trouble once you get back exactly

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it works great while you're up there but

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if you want to come home it tends to

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cause problems okay now and just real

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quick you mentioned that um the crews

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are taking various samples

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during their time on the international

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space station what are some of those

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samples that they're taking and how are

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you guys using them well you know again

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i lead what's called the nutritional

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biochemistry lab and what we do is

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look at at biochemicals things in the

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blood things in the urine

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that tell us about what's going on in

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the bone okay so it it works in concert

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with the x-ray studies that are done

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before and after flight

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um but

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our our magic is is in the blood and

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urine and crews

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um up to five times during flight will

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collect blood samples for us

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um they'll collect urines over the

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course of 24 hours they'll collect all

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their urine for us

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no samples are processed that is the

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blood samples are centrifuged

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and then both the blood and the urine go

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into a freezer onboard station what we

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call the melfi which is a minus 80

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um it's the minus 80 laboratory freezer

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on rss

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those samples are frozen

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um until until we can get them back from

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from station and we just recently got

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some of those back spacex's dragon

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vehicle returning to earth back on may

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18th

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so we now have this return capability

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again

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how much real quick how much did spacex

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bring back for you guys and how quickly

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were you able to get your hands on it

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well for our experiments uh spacex

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brought home just about uh 700 samples

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wow uh tubes of blood and urine

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um so we were very excited about this

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and we're big fans of spacex because

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spacex right now is the only way we can

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bring those samples home

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so that works out very well the spacex

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splashed down a week ago sunday

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last wednesday was when the samples made

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their way back to houston um and and my

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team was there we inventoried samples

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that morning

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brought them all back over to our lab

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and the folks have already started

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processing those and getting them ready

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for analysis so

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the process is a little slow it'll take

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us a few months to get all the work out

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of them but we've already started okay

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well we've been studying bone loss among

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other things for years and years on

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station what are just some of the things

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you know we know that we're losing bone

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what are some of the other things that

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we've really learned and how is that so

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important to space flight in the future

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well again the the exercise the

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exercises and nutrition protocols we've

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we've impacted

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um have managed i would say for the

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first time in 50 years

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uh of flying humans in space we've seen

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folks come home with the same amount of

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bone that they left with which is which

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is a great thing there are still some

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questions out there though because what

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what happens is the crews are

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maintaining

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density of the bone but we don't know if

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the bones are as strong as they were

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when when they left so we're doing some

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follow-on studies there

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we're also looking we're doing some

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follow-on studies

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looking at dietary effects on bone and

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and we've got a study called pro-k

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that is looking at

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the ability to modify the amount of

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protein in the diet or the type of

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protein in the diet and the amount of

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potassium in the diet but potassium

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tends to be rich in

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fruits and vegetables so essentially

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looking at the balance between

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animal protein or meat if you will and

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fruits and vegetables and what we

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believe

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is that by modifying that ratio by

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having more fruits and vegetables and

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perhaps a little less meat

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that we can help to to further mitigate

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the bone loss during space flight that

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will be real important as we send

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astronauts even further for longer

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durations of time absolutely this this

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could have significant impact on

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uh the food systems that we build for

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for exploration missions um and can help

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us better you know again counteract bone

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loss

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um on on those future missions so we're

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very excited about that that

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experiment's been going on for a few

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years and actually reid wiseman who just

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launched will be our last subject in

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that in that study so we're looking

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he's sort of the beginning of the end if

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you will and we're looking forward to

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wrapping that one up and finding out

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what we get gotcha and again so so much

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of what we do on the international space

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station not only for improving astronaut

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health and you know future exploration

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it also very often has benefits to life

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right down here on earth what are some

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of the things that we've learned that's

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going to help benefit people in a real

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way down here on earth that we're hoping

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will in the very near future

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well as you said you know there are a

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number of changes to the body during

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spaceflight and bone is unique in that

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we see very rapid bone loss so we see

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bone loss

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six months of space flight is what you'd

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see in a in a

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a post-menopausal woman in about five

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years wow so we can almost do what you

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would think of as like a time lapse

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photography type study

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where you know if we can find things

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that can impact bone health

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in six months

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to do that same type of study on earth

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would take you uh three four five years

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and the dietary study is a perfect

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example of

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if we can help better understand the

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role of nutrition

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the role of specific dietary components

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on bone loss during space flight