NASA’s record-breaking mission is underway

 

 

 

 

The year-long stay will be a first… the study of twin astronauts, one in space, one home on earth, planning to produce unprecedented monitoring of body performance and changes — with ideal testing subjects, the Kelly astronaut twins.

The science and technology needed to evaluate the impacts of microgravity on the human body and extended stays in space are a new frontier. If we want to get to Mars, we have to learn about how the human body reacts to weightlessness over an extended time.

“One year crew” / NASA

The dimensions of the science / NASA

After a year in space, the traveling twin returns home and they reunite.

Are the identical twins still … identical?

NASA is about to find out.

The experiment harkens back to Einstein’s “Twin Paradox,” a thought experiment in which one twin rockets to the stars at high speed while the other stays home.  According to Einstein’s theory of relativity, the traveling twin should return younger than his brother—strange but true.

The ‘big picture’