When people are sent to space , their soundbox are subjected to some pretty utmost power . How the human body copes with these is obviously of last grandness , and it seems that researchers might be getting closer to figuring out just how microgravityaffects cosmonaut ' vision , as it causes swelling around the highly sore optical nerve .
In a recent discipline , publish inJAMA Ophthalmology , researchers count at the eyes of 15 cosmonaut who had recently complete around six months in outer space . They discover that on retort to Earth , the tissue paper around the back of the oculus where the optic nerve pass through the skull and into the centre socket await swollen and inflamed . They mistrust that this might be one of the reason why astronauts experience problems with their visual modality .
Why this is bechance is less clear . The current theory is that it might be something to do with the home pressure of the eye increasing when in microgravity . They suggest that the body could then be adapting to this novel press while the astronauts are up there for long stop of meter , and that when they then refund to Earth , experience a speedy change in pressure as a upshot , the tissue becomes inflamed and pissed off .
Worryingly , this is n’t the only way that space change of location affects the orb of astronauts . NASA first distinguish back in 2005 that the orb of their space gang were somehow modify shape until they were permanently flattened . This was eventually found to be due to the liquidness that is present in the brain building up in space where it really should n’t , place pressure on the eye and slop them .
The problems that astronauts experience with their vision fall under a condition known asvisual impairment intracranial pressure sensation syndrome , or VIIP , which also affects the brainpower of those who undergo space flights . Last year , researchers discovered that in microgravity the encephalon effectively floats upward andpushes against the top of the skull , physically change its social organisation and physical body , and potentially contributing to VIIP .
Far more work still needs to go into understanding how on the dot this is affecting the astronauts , though , and as such , NASA has made determining the cause of VIIP a top priority if long - continuance space flights and planet colonization are to become a realism .
