Big data analytics for continuous assessment of astronaut health risk and its application to human-in-the-loop (HITL) related aerospace

© 2017, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Inc, AIAA. All rights reserved. The man-instrumentation-equipment-vehicle-environment ecosystem is complex in aerospace missions. Health status of the individual has important implications on decision making and performance that should be factored into assessments for probability of success/risk of failure both in offline and real-time models. To date probabilistic models have not considered the dynamic nature of health status. Big Data analytics is enabling new forms of analytics to assess health status in real-time. There is great potential to integrate dynamic health status information with platforms assessing risk and the probability of success for dynamic individualized real-time probabilistic predictive risk assessment. In this research we present an approach utilizing Big Data analytics to enable continuous assessment of astronaut health risk and show its implications for integration with HITL related aerospace mission

Small scale dynamics of a shearless turbulent/non-turbulent interface in dilute polymer solutions

We study the physics of the turbulent/non-turbulent interface (TNTI) of an isolated turbulent region in dilute polymer solutions and Newtonian fluids. We designed an experimental setup of a turbulent patch growing in water/dilute polymer solutions, without mean shear and far from the walls. The observations from the experiments are complemented and expanded by simulations performed using a localised homogeneous forcing to generate the turbulent front and the Finitely Extensible Elastic model with the Peterlin closure model for the polymer stress. The comparison, which shows that when Newtonian and viscoelastic TNTIs are fed by the same energy they behave in similar manner both in the experiments and in the simulations, permits to extend the applicability, on a qualitative basis, of single relaxation time polymer models also to turbulent/non-turbulent interfaces. From the detailed analysis offered by the numerical results, the alterations in the dynamics between strain and vorticity help understanding the mechanics of the polymer action on the TNTI without mean shear. The reduced vorticity stretching and increased vorticity compression terms are found to be due to the modified degrees of alignment between vorticity, polymer conformation tensor, and rate-of-strain tensor eigenvectors observed especially near the interface. These alignments at the smallest scales of the non-Newtonian turbulent flow lead to a reduced production of enstrophy and consequently to a reduced entrainment, which in this problem are seen as reduced advancement of a turbulent region

Beckman Access versus the Bayer ACS:180 and the Abbott AxSYM cardiac Troponin-I real-time immunoassays: an observational prospective study

BACKGROUND: Reliability of cardiac troponin-I assays under real-time conditions has not been previously well studied. Most large published cTnI trials have utilized protocols which required the freezing of serum (or plasma) for delayed batch cTnI analysis. We sought to correlate the presence of the acute ischemic coronary syndrome (AICS) to troponin-I values obtained in real-time by three random-mode analyzer immunoassay systems: the Beckman ACCESS (BA), the Bayer ACS:180 (CC) and the Abbott AxSYM (AX). METHODS: This was an observational prospective study at a university tertiary referral center. Serum from a convenience sampling of telemetry patients was analyzed in real-time for troponin-I by either the BA-CC (Arm-1) or BA-AX (Arm-2) assay pairs. Presence of the AICS was determined retrospectively and then correlated with troponin-I results. RESULTS: 100 patients were enrolled in Arm-1 (38 with AICS) and 94 in Arm-2 (48 with AICS). The BA system produced 51% false positives in Arm-1, 44% in Arm-2, with negative predictive values of 92% and 100% respectively. In Arm-1, the BA and the CC assays had sensitivities of 97% and 63% and specificities of 18% and 87%. In Arm-2, the BA and the AX assays had sensitivities of 100% and 83% and specificities of 11% and 78%. CONCLUSIONS: In real-time analysis, the performance of the AxSYM and ACS:180 assay systems produced more accurate troponin-I results than the ACCESS system

Analysis of miRNA and mRNA Expression Profiles Highlights Alterations in Ionizing Radiation Response of Human Lymphocytes under Modeled Microgravity

BACKGROUND: Ionizing radiation (IR) can be extremely harmful for human cells since an improper DNA-damage response (DDR) to IR can contribute to carcinogenesis initiation. Perturbations in DDR pathway can originate from alteration in the functionality of the microRNA-mediated gene regulation, being microRNAs (miRNAs) small noncoding RNA that act as post-transcriptional regulators of gene expression. In this study we gained insight into the role of miRNAs in the regulation of DDR to IR under microgravity, a condition of weightlessness experienced by astronauts during space missions, which could have a synergistic action on cells, increasing the risk of radiation exposure. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We analyzed miRNA expression profile of human peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBL) incubated for 4 and 24 h in normal gravity (1 g) and in modeled microgravity (MMG) during the repair time after irradiation with 0.2 and 2Gy of \u3b3-rays. Our results show that MMG alters miRNA expression signature of irradiated PBL by decreasing the number of radio-responsive miRNAs. Moreover, let-7i*, miR-7, miR-7-1*, miR-27a, miR-144, miR-200a, miR-598, miR-650 are deregulated by the combined action of radiation and MMG. Integrated analyses of miRNA and mRNA expression profiles, carried out on PBL of the same donors, identified significant miRNA-mRNA anti-correlations of DDR pathway. Gene Ontology analysis reports that the biological category of "Response to DNA damage" is enriched when PBL are incubated in 1 g but not in MMG. Moreover, some anti-correlated genes of p53-pathway show a different expression level between 1 g and MMG. Functional validation assays using luciferase reporter constructs confirmed miRNA-mRNA interactions derived from target prediction analyses. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: On the whole, by integrating the transcriptome and microRNome, we provide evidence that modeled microgravity can affects the DNA-damage response to IR in human PBL

Development of space technologies and problems of “home medicine”

Experience of cosmonauts’ health monitoring shows that in the study of healthy subjects clinical approach to the evaluation of various medical and physiological data is almost less effective than the evaluation of organism adaptive abilities. The idea of prenosological diagnosis and the concept of adaptive risks develop in space medicine last years. These new space technologies are being actively tested in terrestrial studies in systems as "home medicine". The report presents three variants of systems, respectively, designed to work with a) home PC ("Ecosan-2007" and "Ecosan-TM"), b) Internet connections ("Delta 2013"), c) mobile communication channels ("Traffic Lights of Health"). The main method of functional conditions evaluation in all these systems is the heart rate variability (HRV) analysis. HRV indices allow us to construct a mathematical model and to compute the stress degree of regulatory systems, their functional reserve and adaptive risk

Physiological substantiation of system for individual prenosological control

The article presents the physiological justification of individual prenosological control, which aims to assess the dynamic adaptation risks to predict adaptation disorders. Disease development is preceded at first by the prenosological and then by premorbid conditions. Definitely, these states in healthy people are the object of prenosological control. The heart rate variability analysis was used, which allows using mathematical models and probabilistic approach to estimate the probabilities of different functional states: physiological norm, prenosological and premorbid conditions and adaptation breakdowns. Four groups of individuals with low, medium, high and very high risk of disadaptation were classified at investigation of 120 healthy subjects under long-term medical and environmental research project “Mars-500”. Representative examples of the functional state of annual dynamics show that at very high risk of adaptation of practically healthy people in autumn and spring there are signs of premorbid state. Results of individual prenosological control in a group of volunteers - scientific workers, have shown that even normal daily loads cause a transition to prenosological state. Presented data confirm the viability of the further development of individual prenosological control systems

Perspective use of the technologies for big data analysis in manned space flights on the international space station

Recent technologies in the area of Big Data analytics which provide fast and effective review of various and diverse files of information arriving from different sources are being developed increasingly. Various new software are being proposed to provide useful results in this area. Such technologies are the important stimulus of modern scientific and technical progress, in particular in the field of development of piloted space flights. In this publication we present the prospects of the use of Big Data analytics technology in a system of medical control of crews of the International space station (ISS). Today there is an active accumulation of experience of piloted space flights on ISS where the international scientific and technical cooperation actively develops. An important step withm this direction is the organisation of a new joint Russian-Canadian space experiment "Cosmocard 2018" It will build on the Russian experiment "Cosmocard" which is currently being carried out on the ISS since September, 2014. In this project we have begun work for the modernisation of the software for the onboard computer which will enable the estimation in real-time of a mode of state of health of members of the crew. The Artemis platform, a Big Data analytics platform proposed by McGregor for the analysis of great volumes of physiological and other environmental data, will be used for this purpose. We have begun to reengrneer algorithms for definition of a functional condition of an organism and risk of development of diseases developed previously by the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences to run in real-time within the structure of the new software for the onboard computer that is based on Artemis. These new algorithms will be tested, in the beginning, during simulation experiments with long isolation using the same "Cosmocard" physiological monitoring devices, currently used on the ISS as part of the current "Cosmocard" experiments. They will also be used during research involving various groups of people working in the conditions of chronic stress/sportsmen and the elderly. In addition, the gathering and transmission to an onboard computer of the physiological information from the cosmonaut utilizing wireless data transmission over extended periods of time will be modernised also

Big data analytics for enhanced clinical decision support systems during spaceflight

© 2017 IEEE. Recent advancements in the field of space medicine and technology have extended the boundaries of space travel, presenting humankind with the ability to explore undiscovered habitats. As humans embark on long range missions, adaptation mechanisms will be put to the test, challenging provision of medical care in space. To date, a vast amount of knowledge has been accumulated through a series of experiments, both in terrestrial simulation environments and space missions on the ISS. As a result, functional health state algorithm has been developed and validated by IBMP, to identify transitional states between health and disease. Significant limitations on provision of medical care in space are imposed due to retrospective data processing and analysis techniques. Some of these limitations can be addressed by the proposed instantiation of the functional state algorithm within the Online Analytics component of the Artemis platform, to enhance clinical decision support systems during spaceflight