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we're joined today by dr. Scott Smith

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from here at Johnson Space Center you

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know a big part of the work that's done

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on the space station is trying to figure

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out how astronauts react to living in

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microgravity and one thing in particular

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that some of the experiments onboard the

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station look at is what nutrition can do

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to help with that dr. Scott Smith is a

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the with the biomedical research and

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environmental sciences division here at

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Johnson Space Center he's going to tell

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us a little bit more more about that

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thanks for joining us guy sure thing

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good morning well why don't we start

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with you know why nutritional needs

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would be different in space and they are

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here on the ground well that's a good

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question and obviously the answer is

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that you know when crew members when

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astronauts go into space it's a very

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unique environment there's a lot of

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things that are different about space

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flight and there are on earth besides

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the microgravity the cabin air that they

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breathe is different the way they

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exercise is different the radiation

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exposure is different and your body does

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what you pay it to do which is it adapts

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to live in that environment but what

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happens is in that adaptation it it

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requires different things and you know

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your skeleton is different your muscles

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are different your cardiovascular system

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works differently and again I work in

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the nutrition area and you know

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nutrition is how your body fuels all of

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those systems so trying to understand

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how those requirements change and how we

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can use nutrition to help mitigate some

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of the negative effects of space flight

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is at the heart of what we do so it's

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important but you can actually change

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the way that my astronauts react to

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microgravity using by changing their

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diet basically that's correct I mean

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obviously again in broad strokes what

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we're trying to do is see if we can use

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diet is a way to mitigate the bone loss

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of space flight or the muscle loss of

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space light so it's not just simply you

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know eating to maintain you know

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everyday life it's it's you're trying to

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overcome this environmental challenge

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that you've got okay and I know there

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are a few different experiments going on

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I think one of them is biochemical

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profile can you tell

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a little bit about that one well the

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biochemical profile is I just depends

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how you look at it as sort of a simple

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experiment and what we're doing there is

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we're collecting blood samples and urine

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samples occasionally from the cruise and

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we measure a whole host of of chemicals

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in those samples so we can get a

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snapshot if you will of markers that

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tell us about nutritional status

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vitamins minerals proteins we also get

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markers of bone metabolism we get

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markers of oxidative stress and changes

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in oxygen metabolism and by looking at

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all of those chemicals over the course

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of a mission we can look at how things

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change during flight we can look at that

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in relationship to what they ate or what

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they did and it allows us to have a

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database if you will to go back and look

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at if there are issues that come up with

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individual crews or groups of crews and

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so that one's going on right now I guess

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you don't have that database yet you're

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building it that's correct and it

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actually the biochemical profile

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experiment started last year and it was

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a an extension if you will of an

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experiment we flew earlier called the

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nutrition experiment and that was the

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same sort of thing it's been a bit

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different but so we've been collecting

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blood and urine samples on cruise since

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back on expedition 14 in 2006 we've got

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a fair amount of data but indeed the

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biochemical profiles new and we're still

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we're still working with those okay and

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then I guess there's another experiment

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called pro k it is actually completed

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right our last our last comer has come

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home indeed he landed Reid Wiseman was

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our last subject he landed in November

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and even though even though Reid came

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home some of his samples are still

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onboard station so we're anxiously

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waiting space x5 to come home because

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that's that's the way our samples get

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home at this point okay so it's still a

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little early I guess to tell us you know

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what the results are but can you tell us

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a little bit more about that experiment

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how it was different the point of that

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study again as you mentioned it was

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called pro k and what we're getting at

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there is the relationship of animal

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protein and potassium in the diet and

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the chemical abbreviation for potassium

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is

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so that's where we came from and what we

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maintain is that the higher the ratio of

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those two things in your diet the worse

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it is for bone so in short the more red

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meat you eat and the less fruits and

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vegetables you eat the more bone loss

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he'll have and what we set off to to

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study is if we could use that as a way

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to mitigate bone changes during flight

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so we would feed crews for a short

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period of time for days at a time we

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would feed them a diet that was either

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high animal protein and low potassium or

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the other way around low panel protein

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high potassium and then we looked at the

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difference in the way their bones were

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metabolising the calcium metabolism as a

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result of those diets okay and again

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it's it's still preliminary but the

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initial data we've seen so far are

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encouraging also because we're seeing

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what we expected which is always a good

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thing with the experiment that things

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line up the way you expected and that is

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again that the higher animal protein and

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potassium ratio diets were associated

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with more higher bone breakdown okay

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conversely and i will tell you also

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though one of the things we found which

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is which was a little bit of surprises

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that there are it seems there are many

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factors that also involve bone so one of

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the things that seems to be contributing

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to the the results of the study is that

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the carbon dioxide levels onboard

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station the in air that the crews are

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breathing seems to be a confounding

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factor that with higher co2 levels on

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the diet doesn't seem to have as big an

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effect and that's one of the things

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we're waiting on our final sets of data

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be able to really go in and dig at that

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but interesting on it's it's it's

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intriguing so is there something that

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you could do with that information just

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you keep adjusting the diet or I guess

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you can't really adjust the the type of

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area they're breathing well you know

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there's a couple things we can do I mean

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obviously we we make dietary

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recommendations to cruise all the time

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of you know here's how much protein your

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seed and here's you know try to get more

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fruits and vegetables those kinds of

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things

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as we look towards exploration one of

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the things we can drive is ambient co2

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levels carbon dioxide levels in the

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cabin so that indeed it's hard it's hard

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but not impossible to change the co2

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levels on board station okay again as

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the engineers are off building the next

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vehicles knowing that knowing that the

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environment can affect bone can help

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provide them with guidelines to help

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make things better great well what about

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for us here on earth are there any

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implications that something like this

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would have for us indeed and in in many

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ways I think everything we do has

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implications on earth in part because

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we're studying a generally very healthy

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group of individuals and we're putting

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them in a very strange environment so

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the bone loss for example that we see is

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very similar to people with bone

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diseases on earth the difference is that

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we see it much faster than you see it on

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earth so we can study it over a shorter

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period of time we can study ways to

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counteract it over a shorter period of

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time on a on a six-month space mission

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for example we see about the same change

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in bone that you would see over about

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five years in somebody on earth so it

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allows you to do sort of a rapid look at

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at those changes okay well it sounds

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like a fascinating project and hope to