What are analog astronauts and what do they eat?

“Analogs astronauts they are people who participate in simulated missions to other planets, so they are either professionals or some volunteers who are selected to cope with these difficult conditions, who go along with a mission.” This is what the nutritionist of analog astronauts Christina Ariadni Valagouti said in a special interview.

And he continues: “Such are being away from your family, not having communication, eating certain food, having a certain schedule. These missions can last from 2 weeks to 8 months, and they give us very important data before we send someone to the moon.”

For the inability to represent the lack of gravity, he said to ERT: “Yes, unfortunately we don’t have the lack of gravity, it’s one of the things we can’t measure in an analog mission, because it takes place in Earth, but we can measure everything else. There are no missions or simulations that mimic zero gravity. Usually it is in some other environment, e.g. a mission has been done in a lava tube. They’re done in Antarctica, they’re done in some deserts, in extreme conditions, but not as extreme as zero gravity.”

What are they eating

But what do analog astronauts eat? “Food is prepared exclusively for such conditions usually, whenever any food is dehydrated, it is in bags so that it can be prepared easily and quickly, because they have neither the time nor the facilities to sit down and cook. So it is food that is not very appetizing, that is mainly the problem, it is processed. It’s like noodles that you put water in, like that, you put water in everything and they’re ready, so they’re ready quickly,” he said.

“Unfortunately, it’s not perfect either. It’s better than not eating anything obviously, but then again space station missions are about six months at a time. There is a supply every two to three months, but again this does not mean that there will always be fresh food. It is not that they are all powders, there are also some foods that can be consumed as we get them from the supermarket, some biscuits, some cereals, even dried fruits and nuts, which last a long time, because mainly that is our problem, that they don’t last long enough out of the fridge. We want something easy that lasts a long time. Salted meat is avoided because it has a certain smell, just like fish, we avoid it because of the smell.

How he became an analog astronaut nutritionist

“I did my bachelor’s, my degree, at Harokopio in Athens, as a dietitian nutritionist in this science, and then I did my master’s in the Netherlands on molecular nutrition. None of them were specifically for astronauts. There is no such training. I just wondered at some point what they might be eating,” he said.

And he continued: “I was watching the fires we had in Athens and I was here in the Netherlands. It was quite an emotional situation for me and I kept seeing these posts saying “people need food and please bring us food and clothes” and I wondered what food they would bring because all I could see was rice and some pulses. What I was seeing wasn’t very appetizing, and I concluded after a bit of research that there is no plan for these situations.”

“Now I’m in Holland. Continue. I had a small contract with the European Space Agency, and when that ended, a person who trains analog astronauts approached me and said, “With your experience and knowledge you could take over the nutrition part,” so I agreed. . This is done remotely for now, because the work is in America, but we will see how it goes, because now the pandemic is over, we slowly started to come back. Now I don’t think I’ll go to America, but there will be more face-to-face meetings.”

How many astronaut nutritionists are there around the world? “There is one person at the European Space Agency, there are three or four at NASA and the rest that I have met, they are interested, 3-4 people. We are a very loving community I would say, because we are few and in general we look very much to promote each other” he answered.