Mars missions in crisis as study finds astronauts face DOUBLE the cancer risk previously predicted

Galactic cosmic ray exposure can 'devastate' a cell's nucleus and cause mutations that can result in cancers, researchers warn
Current levels of radiation shielding would, at best, 'modestly' decrease risks

By Mark Prigg For Dailymail.com

Published: 14:16 EST, 7 June 2017 | Updated: 14:38 EST, 7 June 2017

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Going to Mars will be far more dangerous than thought, a new study has discover.

It found the cancer risk for a human mission to Mars is effectively double previous predictions.

It raises major new questions over plans to send man to mars and even further into the solar system.

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Galactic cosmic ray exposure can 'devastate' a cell's nucleus and cause mutations that can result in cancers, researchers warn. Pictured, Matt Damon as Mark Watney in The Martian

THE HEALTH RISKS OF SPACE TRAVEL

Previous studies have shown the health risks from galactic cosmic ray exposure to astronauts include cancer, central nervous system effects, cataracts, circulatory diseases and acute radiation syndromes.

Cosmic rays, such as iron and titanium atoms, heavily damage the cells they traverse because of their very high rates of ionization.

'Exploring Mars will require missions of 900 days or longer and includes more than one year in deep space where exposures to all energies of galactic cosmic ray heavy ions are unavoidable,' UNLV scientist Francis Cucinotta, a leading scholar on radiation and space physics, explained.

'Current levels of radiation shielding would, at best, modestly decrease the exposure risks.'

Cosmic rays, such as iron and titanium atoms, heavily damage the cells they traverse because of their very high rates of ionization.

Conventional risk models used by NASA and others assume DNA damage and mutation are the cause of radiation cancers.

This is based on studies at high doses where all cells are traversed by heavy ions one or more times within much shorter-time periods than will occur during space missions.

In these new findings, a non-targeted effect model – where cancer risk arises in bystander cells close to heavily damaged cells – is shown to lead to a two-fold or more increase in cancer risk compared to the conventional risk model for a Mars mission.

'Galactic cosmic ray exposure can devastate a cell's nucleus and cause mutations that can result in cancers,' Cucinotta explained.

'We learned the damaged cells send signals to the surrounding, unaffected cells and likely modify the tissues' microenvironments.

The findings raise major new questions over plans to travel to Mars and other deep space missions

'Those signals seem to inspire the healthy cells to mutate, thereby causing additional tumors or cancers.'

Cucinotta said the findings show a tremendous need for additional studies focused on cosmic ray exposures to tissues that dominate human cancer risks, and that these should begin prior to long-term space missions outside the Earth's geomagnetic sphere.

He also acknowledged the need to address a moral conundrum.

'Waving or increasing acceptable risk levels raises serious ethical flags, if the true nature of the risks are not sufficiently understood.'