Fun With Fungi

"There's noothin' more I cen do, Cap'n. Ahv tried everthin'. Radiation levels are at critical, and soon our skin will begin meltin' froom ahr boohns. I'm sorey, Cap'n, yer gunta havta fire me." Scotty hung his head in shame as he finally admitted the unthinkable. He really didn't have a magical solution to the radiation that was flooding the ship from the ruptured nuclear-coolant-injector. He had nothing involving a revolutionary new matter/anti-matter mixture, or reversing polarity on the containment fields, or even an alien technology he could graft into the Enterprise's systems on short notice which would somehow just happen to have a compatible operating system and a nuclear-coolant-injector-failure failsafe button. No, this time there was truly no hope.

Scotty wasn't alone in his inability to pull a routine miracle out of his engineer's hat. The rest of the crew was failing just as spectacularly. The red-shirts had already gone the way of all red-shirts. Sulu, Uhura, Chekov and O' Reilly had all gone mad from the radiation exposure, so they were equally useless, having already dismantled the ship's navigational and communication systems in an insane attempt to simulate a fifteenth-century karaoke bar. (The first thing that goes with radiation-induced madness apparently being awareness of the historical time-line.) Despite all his protestations that he was a doctor, not a lounge singer, Bones didn't have a miraculous injection to inoculate the crew from the radiation leak using a quadrotriticale-based tribble-blood extract, and even Spock, after a brief but disastrous attempt at a mind-meld with the nuclear-coolant-injector, had receded into an impotent lump, content to stroke tribbles and listen to Chekov's rendition of "Back in the USSR," while Rand tried to get everyone to look at her legs.

Although Kirk found it difficult to focus on anything but Rand's lower appendages, he knew that with the rest of the crew so incapacitated by inadequacy, it was up to him to save the ship. Again. (He also thought that when he got back to Star Fleet he ought to look into hiring some more competant officers, but that was only a fleeting notion.) Back to the task at hand--saving the ship. Again. (He started to play the mental tape about finding some new officers, but then he realised he had just done that.) Okay, really back to the task at hand now. He spent a few minutes looking conflicted and dramatic, ocassionally putting some very strong emphasis into his ongoing monologue. For some reason, dramatic monologues were the best way to kick-start his thought processes. He wasn't sure why, but he just seemed to be wired that way.

After a particularly lengthy and dramatic monologue, during which Uhura had enough time to give a stirring rendition of "Endless Love", and the trio of Chekov, Sulu and O'Reilly managed to throw together a fair performance of "Born to be Wild," suddenly, it came to him. Of course, why hadn't he thought of this before? He took just a moment for a manly pose, and then called down to his defeated engineer, "Scotty, release the fungi!" "Ehr yeh shoor, Cap'n? Ah dunna know what that'll doo." "Just do it, man," the Captain cried, "We've got no choice. It's the fungi, or death." "Aye Cap'n," Scotty said resignedly, and slowly his hand reached out and pressed the fungi-release-button.

What nonsense, you must be thinking (and if you're not, maybe you should go back and read the part about fifteenth-century karaoke.) Of course it's nonsense. Well, most of it anyway. Can you guess which part of our Star Trek adventure has any basis in the non-nonsensical world? I bet you can. It's the radiation-eating fungi, of course!! Believe it or not, there are actually three known forms of fungi that convert radiation to energy the same way plants convert sunlight to energy. The main difference between them is that plants use chlorophyl for the process of photosynthesis, while the fungi use melanin (you know, the stuff that determines your skin color) to perform what I suppose I must call "radiosynthesis."

David Ewing Duncan, at Technology Review (an MIT publication), explains that this radiation-eating fungi could prove a boon in many ways, including as a nuclear clean-up crew, a food source in space, and a new form of biofuel. Versatile little critters, eh? Who would've thought of fungi as a potential source for alternative energy? It'll be fun to watch where this one goes.

I probably should wrap up our space adventure now. Using the radiation-eating fungi, Kirk managed to stave off the imminent destruction, although not in time to avoid a very bad rendition of "Bitter Dregs," performed by Spock and the tribbles. Uhura is now headlining on Wriggley's Pleasure Planet, whenever the Enterprise heads into that region of space. Stay tuned for our next episode with Kirk and his crew (who do manage to hold onto their jobs, by the way), in which we will probably have to deal with what happens when the fungi, fed by massive amounts of radiation, grow to sentience and try to take over the Enterprise. For now, let's just say there won't be karaoke, but there will probably be lots of monologues, and Kirk will have to save the ship. Again.

How To Protect Yourself From Cosmic Rays If You Ever Happen To Make It Into Space

This one is fun. Remember back in September when the poor commander got lost on Mars and couldn't understand Base's instructions? No? Okay, go here first and refresh your memory. I'll wait... Finished? Then we're ready to move on. Since you've now done your homework, you know that the reason the Mars mission was in jeopardy was that the crew's brains were being scrambled by radiation. Radiation is a big problem that scientists are going to have to figure out before humans start heading out past the protection of the Earth's magnetic field, beyond the orbit where the International Space Station flies above the Earth in relative safety. The Moon and Mars, as we all know, are on the short list for mission possibilities, and spending such long periods of time in space could do more than scramble a few brain cells; if current theories are correct, astronauts could be risking premature aging by heading out into the cosmic ray zone. (That last link leads to an interesting article about space radiation, telomeres, Einstein and pills to repair DNA damage--I followed a link from there to one about what the heck telomeres are, and how they affect aging, with possible implications for human life extension. Pretty interesting if you want to follow some rabbit trails.)

All of that aside, however, what I really want to tell you about is the idea some scientists have for blocking all that radiation, so that no astronautical DNA is damaged in the first place. Patrick L. Barry wrote an article for NASA about how they are looking to make space ships out of a revolutionary new material--you're not going to guess this one in a million years. (Well, okay, I wouldn't have guessed it in a million years.) The material? Plastic. Polyethylene, to be precise. This is what they use to make the plastic trash bags of which we all have an abundance under our kitchen sink.

Most household trash bags are made of a polymer called polyethylene. Variants of that molecule turn out to be excellent at shielding the most dangerous forms of space radiation. Scientists have long known this. The trouble has been trying to build a spaceship out of the flimsy stuff.

But now NASA scientists have invented a groundbreaking, polyethylene-based material called RXF1 that's even stronger and lighter than aluminum. "This new material is a first in the sense that it combines superior structural properties with superior shielding properties," says Nasser Barghouty, Project Scientist for NASA's Space Radiation Shielding Project at the Marshall Space Flight Center.

To Mars in a plastic spaceship? As daft as it may sound, it could be the safest way to go.

According to Barry, one of plastic's big selling points is that when radiation smashes into it, it doesn't produce nearly as much "secondary radiation" as materials like aluminum or lead. That secondary radiation can be just as much of a problem for astronauts as the cosmic rays themselves:

The advantage of plastic-like materials is that they produce far less "secondary radiation" than heavier materials like aluminum or lead. Secondary radiation comes from the shielding material itself. When particles of space radiation smash into atoms within the shield, they trigger tiny nuclear reactions. Those reactions produce a shower of nuclear byproducts -- neutrons and other particles -- that enter the spacecraft. It's a bit like trying to protect yourself from a flying bowling ball by erecting a wall of pins. You avoid the ball but get pelted by pins. "Secondaries" can be worse for astronauts' health than the original space radiation!

Barry says the lighter elements of hydrogen and carbon, the building blocks for those plastic bags, won't completely stop the space radiation, but can fragment that radiation so that it is much less harmful. He uses the example of a chain link fence blocking a snowball. Some snow still gets through, but it doesn't hurt as much. This author has a knack for making scientific-speak understandable, doesn't he? I'll let him tell you more:

Despite their shielding power, ordinary trash bags obviously won't do for building a spaceship. So Barghouty and his colleagues have been trying to beef-up polyethylene for aerospace work.

That's how Shielding Project researcher Raj Kaul, working together with Barghouty, came to invent RXF1. RXF1 is remarkably strong and light: it has 3 times the tensile strength of aluminum, yet is 2.6 times lighter -- impressive even by aerospace standards.

"Since it is a ballistic shield, it also deflects micrometeorites," says Kaul, who had previously worked with similar materials in developing helicopter armor. "Since it's a fabric, it can be draped around molds and shaped into specific spacecraft components." And because it's derived from polyethylene, it's an excellent radiation shield as well.

They're working on ways to address some of the drawbacks that come with polyethylene--like the irritating tendency it has to burn and melt and whatnot. Now, this article is over a year old, and my search on the NASA site didn't lead me to any more updated information, so I can't tell you right now how this research is progressing. Back in August of 2005, no one was sure yet whether plastic really could serve as a shield to make space travel safer, but "hypothetically" polyethylene might be "not just for trash bags anymore."

It's so interesting how many useful discoveries for right here on Earth come out of space research. Man may never fly to the Moon in a plastic rocket. We may never see plastic habitats on Mars, but--and this is important--we can be pretty sure that our garbage will never get cancer from radiation!! That's an encouraging breakthrough, right? Even more valuable, now that we've all read the reports from NASA and know how useful plastic bags can be, we can make the important fashion decision about whether we want to wear plastic bags over our clothes when we go outside, to protect ourselves from cosmic rays. Hey, come on, it's not such a bad idea. If enough of us do it, it could even become trendy. Maybe if we get some Hollywood type to do it first we can all pretend it's actually cool. Then we would just look like lemmings, and not freaks. Hmmm. Let me think about this. Somebody sci fi maybe, but with crossover appeal.... I've got it! Will Smith!! Men In Black, I Robot, Independence Day... yeah, he'd do nicely. Somebody out there want to volunteer to suggest it to him?

Note: Yes, I know I'm being goofy today. I can't seem to help myself. I start out with a perfectly reasonable piece about the science of using plastic as a radiation shield and end up looking to make Will Smith the poster boy for the tinfoil hat brigade (plastic bag, tinfoil hat--same difference.) I'll try to control myself now, but I make no promises. I have a very good excuse. The day started out with snow, and that always gets me a little giddy. Wait a minute... Snow comes from the sky. Cosmic rays come from the sky, too. Maybe I'm so goofy because the cosmic rays are making it past the Earth's magnetic field and sneaking down into my neighborhood disguised as snow!!! This could be a real problem. I better go put on some plastic bags just in case.

Mission To Mars

"Say again, Base Command? I don't understand. What do you want me to do? What am I looking for? Mars is too big. I can't find base-camp. Oh, we should never have come." The commander panicked as he realised he was lost, and he couldn't understand Base's instructions. It had only been a half an hour since he had taken off in search of the caves, and he had headed his rover in a straight path toward the designated coordinates, but something was wrong. He should have reached the caves by now. He should have seen the double peak just to the right of Sydney crater, which marked the opening to the series of caverns that Earth Command had sent him to explore, and now, when he knew he should be right on target, he was completely turned around. He couldn't even trace back along the route he had followed to relocate camp.

How could he have gotten so disoriented? He had only been driving for half an hour. Or was it half an hour? He looked intently at his watch and tried to remember exactly what the time had been when he left the confines of the Mars Base habitat. Memory failed him, despite the intense pressure he put on himself to think. Think. Why was that getting so much harder lately? Every day further into space had been more of a struggle on the long journey from Earth. He couldn't think clearly. Base-camp wasn't any help; none of them were doing any better than he was. Why was he feeling such anxiety? Why couldn't he remember even what time he had set out? Why hadn't he seen the landmarks he knew were right there? Somewhere.

The poor commander was really only a few hundred meters from his desired destination, but couldn't figure out where he was, or remember how to get home. Why? Radiation. Radiation can potentially cause problems with memory, spacial learning, and stress, according to an article by David Shiga, at New Scientist Space. Radiation. Space is full of it. We have a built-in defense from radiation here on Earth. A haven from the bombardment from space, our atmosphere protects us from much of its harmful effects. Even orbiting astronauts, tucked away up in the International Space Station, or jaunting about in a shuttle, or rocket, are kept safe from the dangers of most of the stray energy particles from space by the extended shielding of the Earth's magnetic field. What happens. though, if we leave the protection of our big blue marble?

NASA is looking to find out. According to Shiga, "...NASA recently awarded funding for 12 projects that will investigate how long-term radiation exposure in interplanetary space could potentially cause health problems in astronauts." Some of these projects are serving up some interesting results. One study, by Bernard Rabin of the University of Maryland in Baltimore, involves studying irradiated rats:

Rats whose brains have been exposed to heavy particle radiation perform more poorly in navigating mazes and have a harder time learning to press a button to get a food pellet. They also are more easily distracted and experience more anxiety in stressful situations.

One of the more intriguing findings in this study is that rats given strawberry and blueberry extracts before receiving the radiation were less likely to have their mental function impaired. The speculation in Shiga's article is that the anti-oxidants in the berries are the protectant factor:

This could be because the extracts contain antioxidants. Researchers still do not know exactly how heavy particle radiation creates cognitive problems, but it is known to create highly reactive oxygen-containing molecules in the body.

So-called reactive oxygen species are suspected as a contributor to the ageing process. As it turns out, the problems the rats encounter from radiation exposure are very similar to those that ageing rats experience, Rabin says.

Maybe if they just feed astronauts on an anti-oxidant rich diet, they won't suffer any ill effects from space radiation, and they won't get any older. Heck of a deal. (Unless that not getting any older involves not getting any older, if you know what I mean, or is that too obscure?) Anyway, the point of the NASA funding for these types of projects is partly to find out just how much radiation is tolerable, so they can design spaceships and missions which will keep the radiation exposure within acceptable limits. I'm sure they have other studies going on to determine exactly how to do that, what materials to use, what time parameters to establish, what Lunar and Martian materials may be adapted to astronaut use, as well as a whole host of studies designed just to help them think up more questions and possible scenarios, that will need further studies to come up with the answers.

While they are doing all this, I hope they stay away from sources of radiation themselves. We've seen what can happen to people who aren't properly shielded. If it weren't for the help of a friendly alien who happened to be passing by, our commander might still be wandering around Mars. Fortunately, the alien, from the lovely planet Gardenium, found him and led him back to base-camp. The other-worldly savior also brought them a token of good will--an eighteen month supply of strawberries and blueberries. Wasn't that a nice thing to do?