h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I can understand that our muscles are atrophying when they are not being used. They normally respond to the amount they are being used by growing or shrinking even here on Earth. I don't quite see the reason why our bones are weakened in space though. Aren't bones pretty reliable things, that don't tend to get stronger or weaker depending on how much weight they have to carry? Then why don't they just stay at a constant strength in space? Do they waste away just to annoy us?

I think it has something to do with how the bone cells are aligned due to the downward pull of gravity. Muscle cells do this too, both are constructed out of minerals and materials that circulate in our bloodstreams, and the linearity of gravity helps them form correctly.

Or maybe I've got it all wrong, but that;s the way I heard it, back in the Cretaceous or so...

>Aren't bones pretty reliable things, that don't tend to get stronger or weaker depending on how much weight they have to carry? <

Not true - go weight training and build up your bone mass, strength along with tendons and stuff.

Bone is living tissue along with the rest of you and is consantly being built up and broken down. You can make your bones a lot stronger with training.


So, don't train 'em and watch them get weaker.

http://www.orthone.com/maintaining-bone-strength.html