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Visuo-motor Coordination During Space Flight

Principal Investigators

The Visuo-motor Coordination During Space Flight study is funded by the Canadian Space Agency's Space Science Program and is carried out by Dr. Barry Fowler of York University in Toronto, in collaboration with Dr. Otmar Bock, formerly of the Institute of Solar and Terrestrial Sciences in Toronto, and now affiliated with the Deutsche Sporthochschule Koeln, in Germany.

Experiment description

The Visuo-motor Coordination During Space Flight experiment was designed to measure the subtle loss of eye-hand co-ordination that occurs when astronauts work in the weightless environment of space and that can result in safety problems and a substantial reduction in their work rate.

 

On Earth, when humans make simple, everyday movements like pointing to an object or catching a ball, the nervous system takes gravity into account. The brain integrates information from the eyes and inner ear, as well as from nerves in the joints and muscles, to make a smooth, accurate movement. In space, however, the inner ear no longer provides the brain with useful information about "up" or "down", and the nerves in the joints are sensing the movements of weightless limbs.

Astronauts can easily misjudge simple distances that they normally wouldn't on Earth. The nervous system must adapt so astronauts can function effectively.

 

Experiment procedure

The study was performed by four astronauts before, during and after the flight, during half-hour sessions, using the Visuo-Motor Coordination Facility (VCF) designed and built by Bristol Aerospace Limited of Winnipeg.

The VCF is an apparatus that projects visual targets onto a screen. As the targets appeared, the astronaut pointed at them as they moved from place to place, grasped at them as they changed in size, and tracked them as they moved in a circle. During the test, the astronaut wore a specially designed glove that allowed precise tracking of hand movements and response times.

Equipped with light-emitting diodes on the fingertips, the glove provided a trail that the VCF used to produce a three-dimensional recording. Motor skills demonstrated by the astronaut early, midway, and late in the mission was compared to detect any changes in performance, and to chronicle the adaptation of the nervous system as the astronaut adjusts to weightlessness. This will help to find out whether humans can naturally recalibrate their movements to suit a microgravity environment. If they can, all the better; one less complication for lengthy stays aboard space stations. But if they can't, Dr. Fowler's team will study the results to determine the best strategy for helping astronauts overcome these problems.

Benefits

Beside astronauts themselves, aviation engineers will also gain knowledge from VCF's results to help them design safer cockpit instrumentation in Space Shuttles and high-speed aircraft. By anticipating a pilot's precise reaction to either ongoing or sudden periods of weightlessness, engineers will be able to strategically place instrumentation in a manner that accounts for the pilot's limited co-ordination.

New methods for programming the movements of robots were generated during the development of Dr. Bock's VCF experiment. With further refinement, these methods could improve the capacity of robots to perform complex tasks.