The key to these is the travel time involved. The universe is so big and human technology is so limited that the time it takes to travel to another star presents a significant barrier.
For example, it would take the Voyager 1 spacecraft 73,000 years to reach the closest star to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, at its current speed.
Voyager launched more than 40 years ago, but modern spacecraft might be expected to travel faster. Even so, with current technology, this journey would take thousands of years.
One possible solution is a generation ship that sees multiple generations of space travelers live and die before reaching their final destination. Another, if implemented well, is artificial hibernation.
This was initiated by scientists at the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology (SIAT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. By chemically inducing hypothermia in monkeys, not humans.
“Here we show that activating a subpopulation of preoptic area (POA) neurons by a chemogenetic strategy reliably induces hypothermia in anesthetized and freely moving macaques.” The researchers wrote in their paper.
“Overall, our findings point to a central regulation of body temperature in primates, paving the way for future applications in the clinical setting.”
Hibernation and a slightly lethargic diapause state are physiological states that allow animals to withstand adverse conditions such as extreme cold and hypoxia.
It lowers your body temperature, slows your metabolism, and keeps your body in a minimal “maintenance mode.” This is the bare minimum to keep you alive while preventing atrophy.
It is found in some animals, including warm-blooded mammals, but rarely in primates. SIAT neuroscientists Wang Hong and Dai Ji artificially engineered hypometabolism and hibernation in primates by chemically manipulating neurons in the hypothalamus (preoptic neurons) involved in sleep and thermoregulatory processes. I wanted to see if I could actually trigger it.
This study involved three young male monkeys (Macaca fascicularis). Both under anesthesia and non-anesthesia, the researchers have been shown to activate specific modified receptors in the brain known as designer receptors, or DREADD, that are exclusively activated by designer drugs. I applied the designed drug.
Scientists then studied the results using functional magnetic resonance imaging, behavioral changes, and physiological and biochemical changes.
“To investigate the brain-wide network as a result of preoptic area (POA) activation, we performed fMRI scans and identified multiple regions involved in thermoregulation and interoception,” says Dai. .
“This is the first fMRI study to investigate functional connectivity across the brain revealed by chemogenetic activation.”
Researchers have found that a synthetic drug called clozapine N-oxide (CNO) reliably induces hypothermia in both anesthetized and awake macaques.
However, in anesthetized monkeys, CNO-induced hypothermia reduced core body temperature and prevented external heating. The researchers say this indicates that her POA neurons play an important role in thermoregulation in primates.
The researchers recorded behavioral changes in awake monkeys and compared them to hypothermia-induced mice. Mice typically reduce their activity and lower their heart rate in an attempt to conserve heat.
In contrast, the monkey showed an increase in heart rate and activity level and even started shivering. This suggests that thermoregulation in primates is more complex than in mice. Human hibernation (if it can) should take this into account.
“This study provides the first successful demonstration of primate hypothermia based on targeted neuronal manipulation,” says Wang.
“With the growing passion for human spaceflight, this hypothermic monkey model is a milestone in the long road to artificial hibernation.”
This research innovation.