This must be a dream job for couch potatoes! Nasa is willing to pay you over $5000 a month — and all you have to do is spend 70 days in bed.
The “Bed Rest Study” being conducted by the US space agency is designed to study the effects of prolonged exposure to microgravity and requires participants to remain horizontal for a period of 70 days. Conducted by the agency’s Flight An-alogs Project Team at the Johnson Space Centre, the “Bed Rest Study” is an ongoing effort to improve conditions for astronauts working in a weightless environment. Since large-scale studies are unfeasible in orbit, the effects of microgravity must be simulated on the ground. Head-down bed rest, it turns out, offers an excellent alternative to space flight, Medical Daily reported.
“This study will show how much your body, tilted down slightly with head down and feet up, for 70 days, 24-hours a day, without getting out of bed, except for limited times for specific tests, is like an astronaut’s body during the weightlessness of space flight,” according to Nasa. “Watching you will help scientists learn how an astronaut’s body will change during space flight in the future,” the agency said.
The programme divides participants into exercising subjects and non-exercising subjects.