Space Agency Paying $27,263.80 to Stay In Bed for 60 Days.

The Institute for Space Medicine and Physiology in France is in dire need of guinea pigs to be sedentary for a few days at a time in their base level study.

The purpose: learning more about the human body's response to low-gravity.

Participants (female only, male trials are complete -sorry lads) will be paid by the European Space Agency for their time and will be served all meals and as much TV series streaming as they can handle. 

The equipment: a dry-immersion bath.

Think of a water bed/bean bag hybrid that lets you become enveloped by the bladder without becoming wet. 

The dry-immersion baths are a means of putting the body in a type of floating like space with almost zero pressure on the body. 

Sounds pretty cool right?

Well, there are some side effects...

You can learn about what it is like for astronauts to come home here.

But in short terms, people in microgravity lose muscle mass - as they aren't used anywhere near as much - bone mass and general healthy bodily constitution.

Additionally, fluid in your eyes and brain will get a bit more freedom to follow where gravity dictates. 

Also, during the testing phase, researchers will have to take regular blood samples and biopsies to see how your body is faring in low-gravity over time.

Still interested?

Or not extreme enough for you?

There is a 'hard difficulty' you could try and that is lying for a few days on a meagre 6-degree decline with your head below parallel. 

All while being completely immobilized and blood pooling in the brain.

Still not difficult enough?

How about doing it for sixty days, not five...

STILL not difficult enough?

Try hardcore difficulty where you are immobilised, head 6-degrees below parallel, for sixty days and part of the study involves a spinning bed.

Jennifer Ngo-Anh, leader of the ESA's human spaceflight team said:

"We will not be doing any specific experiments for this first round, but we will collect data to better understand the dry immersion model and how women react to assess these studies for more extensive investigations in the future."

She also commented on the conditions and difficulty of what is needed in the testing phase of lying immobilised for days at a time:

"We get many requests to be a volunteer for these studies, but they are no joke, lying in bed sounds fun but the pleasure wears off very quickly. WE constantly salute the volunteers that sacrifice their daily lives for the benefit of human exploration!"

Over a 60 day period, participants must have at least one shoulder in contact with the bed at all times. 

And that's for EVERYTHING.

Bathing, restroom visits, you name it. 

In 2014, NASA conducted a similar study for 70 days and by the end of it, the participants had extreme headaches, bedsores, severe backaches, and worsening suicidal thoughts. 

Participants mentioned what they missed in a detailed and depressing series of diary entries including coffee, beer, walking around the house, sunlight and basic social interactions. 

Participants in the 2014 study were specifically chosen for their athletic aptitudes, such as triathlon racers and sportsmen/women.

During the incessant prodding, participants grew tired very quickly as nurses would interrogate them over bowel movements, body scans, blood tests, as well as mild electric shocks to test the maximal muscle twitches of the wasting muscles. 

Participants were also asked to lie in an MRI machine motionless for 90+  minutes and breathe diluted carbon monoxide for example. 

Post-study, participants showed a massive decline in basic flexibility and muscle strength.

When upright they also had major trouble balancing and maintaining the ability to walk. 

It took several weeks just to become acclimatised to being upright again with some subjects taking longer than others to recoup. 

Do you still think it is worth it?

How long could you last int his environment?

Let us know in the comments!
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