A major obstacle to human colonization of the galaxy , or at least the Solar System , looks a touch less intimidating , thanks to some freeze - dried black eye spermatozoan . Mouse sperm stored on the International Space Station for nine month has been devolve to Earth and used to successfully inseminate female mouse . The resulting mice had only slightly more mutant than controls born from sperm that stayed on the priming coat .
“ radiation sickness on the International Space Station is more than 100 times stronger than that on Earth , ” remark a paper inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . The place is like on the Moon , and little better on Mars , given the close absence seizure of protective atmospheres and magnetic fields . This has often been raised as an obstacle to enlargement beyond Earth . Although humans can pull round this radiation sickness , there is a inquiry of how well ourgermlines – eggs and spermatozoan – would do over an extended period .
Damage to germlines sometimes shows up , not in the immediate offspring , but thefollowing generation , so the team allowed some of the black eye produced in this way to pair , finding they were fertile . The newspaper does not show any increase in genetic ill - health among mice descend from the cryogenic astronauts .
examine the viability of frozen spermatozoon is important because there is a high opportunity future infinite colonies will use it , at least to some extent . The authors note that assisted procreative technology is on the ascent . place colonies are likely to start small , and look problems of deficient genetical diversity , which could most well be call using frozen sperm and eggs from those left behind . Yet stock-still germ cells are unable to repair desoxyribonucleic acid damage in the way mammalian cells can do in a living torso .
Although mouse make useful subjects for such research , given the short maternity time once the sperm is returned to Earth , reproduction with a all-inclusive variety of animals may be required before we risk humans . There have already been a bit of experiment on the reproduction of invertebrates , raspberry andmost famouslygeckos in microgravity , with extra irradiation an inevitable part of the enquiry . Presumably , the next gradation is larger mammal , a topic on which the Muppets hadsomething to say .
