FIRST STEPS TOWARD SPACE - Smithsonian Institution Libraries

80 SMITHSONIAN ANNALS OF FLIGHT
NOTES
1. "If you want to get to the moon, it is better to try with
mice first!" Parenthetically, I would like to mention the
Moonbeam Mouse Project that was the realization, thirty years
later, of the foregoing statement. This project was presented
before the 155th Annual Convention of the Medical Society
of New York at Rochester, New York, 12 May 1961. Its aim
was to acquire as much physiopathologic data as possible
from the moon for medical evaluation before the advent of
man. The purpose was threefold: (1) to investigate the behavior
and effects of transplanted terrestrial life under
physical lunar conditions, (2) to detect possible lunar microbial
life, and (3) to study the effects of such captive hosts on
the terrestrial germ-free rodent guests. It represented a refined
inter-disciplinary study with multiple-channel telemetry
of exquisite biomedical data for a predetermined length of
time for recording respiration rate, body temperature, blood
pressure, blood flow, red and white corpuscle count, also,
determination of the gamma-globulin. Gamma-globulin itself
is almost completely absent in absolutely germ-free bred
mice. The mice themselves were to be contained in a special
vehicle that would bore itself mechanically into the ground
up to ten meters. The lunar soil was to be drawn into the
specially designed capsule where the mice would be exposed
to the radiation-free and temperature-constant subsurface
lunar soil. The mouse-carrying capsule was to be thoroughly
sterilized with ethylene oxide and to have a self-supporting
ecology for a two-week life supporting period under the
surface of the moon.
Since mice do not catch colds, they would be spared the
discomfort of Astronauts Walter M. Schirra, Donn F. Eisele,
and Walter Cunningham. Coryza was noticed first by Schirra
within the first 24 hours; later the other astronauts became
infected during the 11-day orbital flight of the Apollo 7
capsule, 11-27 October 1968, using 100-percent oxygen at
about 5 pounds pressure. Isolation of a period of 2-3 weeks
would be medically sound before extended space flights.
What happened to the "Moonbeam Mouse Project"? It
died prematurely at the hands of a high NASA executive
in the life sciences (1960). He could not foresee "how mice
could survive in the moon's environment which does not
have an appreciable atmosphere," even though the major
details of propulsion, landing, life-support, telemetry, etc.,
were workable. It received, however, recognition by two
world-renowned scientists: a NASA rocket engineer who commented
that "this project could be of value for future
manned lunar landings"; and a microbiologist of the Rockefeller
Institute, who stated that it "presents a great interest
from both the biological and medical points of view. In
brief, I would be inclined to regard your project as a necessary
first step in the analysis of the ecological problems that
will arise when terrestrial organisms enter into contact with
the various aspects of the lunar environment." The project
was not pursued further.
See also C. D. J. Generales, "Selected Events Leading to
the Development of Space Medicine," New York State Journal
of Medicine, vol. 63, no. 9 (May 1963), p. 1310.
2. In his Zoonomia (1795), saying:
Another way of procuring sleep mechanically was related to
me by Mr. Brindley, the famous canal engineer, who was
brought up to the business of a mill-wright: he told me
that he had more than once seen the experiment of a man
extending himself across the large stone of a corn mill, and
that by gradually letting the stone whirl, the man fell asleep,
before the stone had gained its full velocity, and he supposed
would have died without pain by the continuance or increase
of the motion. In this case the centrifugal motion of the
head and feet must accumulate the blood in both extremities
of the body, and thus compress the brain.
3. William J. White, A History of the Centrifuge in Aerospace
Medicine (Douglas Aircraft Company, Inc., Santa
Monica, California, 1964).
4. Generales, "Space Medicine and the Physician," New
York State Journal of Medicine, vol. 60, no. 11 (1 June 1960),
p. 1745.
5. Peter Lyon, "When Man First Left the Earth," Horizons,
vol. 1, September 1958, pp. 114-28.
6. Erik Bergaust, Reaching for the Stars (New York City:
Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1960), p. 59; and Project Satellite
(New York City: British Book Center, Inc., 1958), p. 23;
Wernher von Braun, "Reminiscences of German Rocketry,"
Journal of the British Interplanetary Society, vol. 15, no. 3
(May-June 1956), p. 128; "Constantine D. J. Generales, Jr.,"
Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Report, Harvard College—1954
(Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Printing
Office), p. 429; "Space Medicine," in History of Medicine
"An International Bibliography," The Welcome Historical
Medical Library, vol. 27, no. 177 (April-May 1960); "Die
Traene Der Ruehrung Quilt," Weltbild, Munich, June 2,
1958, p. 4; "Constantine D. J. Generales, Jr.," Explorers
Journal, vol. 37, no. 4 (December 1959) p. 10; and "Marsoch
Venus-skott at vanta nar som heist" (from page 1 of
Stockholms-Tidningen, 16 August 1960), Explorers Journal,
vol. 38, no. 4 (December 1960), p. 18.
7. "Reminiscences of German Rocketry," Journal of the
British Interplanetary Society, vol. 15, no. 3 (May-June 1956),
p. 129.
8. See note 4.
9. "His Eyes Are on the Stars," Saga, February 1961.
10. Generales, "The Dynamics of Cosmic Medicine," New
York State Journal of Medicine, vol. 64, no. 2 (15 January
1964), p. 231.
11. Martin Lansberg, A Primer in Space Medicine (New
York City: Elsevier Publishing Company, 1960).