As part of third Axiom Space private mission (Ax-3), the Italian Space Agency and the Department of Biomedical, Experimental and Clinical Sciences of the University of Florence (UniFi), in collaboration with the Italian Navy, launched the “NUT” project. NUT aims to discriminate the psychophysical effects caused by stressors unique of the space environment, such as microgravity and radiation, from those due to isolation and confinement.

There is wide evidence that space flight can lead to adverse effects on astronauts’ physiology. Besides altered gravity and cosmic rays, astronauts are also exposed to isolation, confinement, and psychophysical stress, which can exacerbate the negative effects of spaceflight or cause major psychological, cognitive, and physiological alterations. Isolation and confinement will have a strong impact on the future long-duration interplanetary missions and, if not properly managed, could compromise crew performance and mission success.

The NUT project compared chemical-clinical and biological parameters of both astronauts, involved in the Ax-3 mission, and Italian Navy submariners. Submarines are an ideal analogue of space vehicles and space stations. The crew of a submarine mission faces the same stressors as astronauts during space missions in terms of isolation, artificial light and hypoxic environment. Moreover, submarine missions are numerous, enabling collection of a considerable amount of data, which is a limiting factor for space research. Hence, conducting studies on submarine crews is crucial to advance our understanding of the long-term effects of isolation and confinement.

Although short missions such as Ax-3 (21 days) do not significantly affect the organism, the NUT project results collected to date highlighted changes in inflammatory cytokine levels and some metabolic parameters. These changes indicate a tendency for increased systemic inflammation and oxidative stress, which are more pronounced on long duration missions. Interestingly, inflammatory cytokines show a similar trend in AX-3 astronauts and submariners.

“Considering that submariners are not exposed to microgravity and radiation, but both study groups (astronauts and submariners) are in isolation/confinement conditions, these results suggest that isolation and confinement play an important role in inducing altered systemic inflammation levels,” comments the project's scientific coordinator, Dr. Monica Monici of the ASAcampus Joint Laboratory, Div. Ric. ASA, Dept. of Experimental and Clinical Biomedical Sciences, UniFi.

With this project, the Italian Navy and its personnel strengthen their interest in contributing to active scientific research. While enrolment for the study was on a voluntary base, the opportunity to collaborate with ASI and UniFi saw an enthusiastic participation of many of the crew members. Submariners were keen to help further technological innovation and advance the knowledge regarding the psycho-physical well-being of the crews – a mandate of the Armed Forces.

Dr. Francesca Ferranti (ASI), scientific coordinator of the project, adds "Future human deep space exploration scenarios will expose astronauts to extreme isolation/confinement conditions as well as prolonged and unavoidable dependence on automated life support systems. This will significantly impact human psychology and physiology”. Moreover, she continues, “The collaboration with the Italian Navy represents a unique opportunity for research in this area, giving the Italian scientific community access to what we believe to be an ideal terrestrial analogue for isolation/confinement studies. The results of the NUT project confirm this".

Above: Diving U-212 Submarine (Credits: Italian Navy) 

Below: NUT logo