Hibernating for Deep Spaceflight with Ryan Sprenger

How close are we to enabling astronauts to go into deep sleep for long space journeys? Neil deGrasse Tyson, Chuck Nice, & Gary O’Reilly team up with Ryan Sprenger, Senior Research Scientist at Fauna Bio, to explore whether humans can hibernate like animals do.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Guys, am I right that we just did a whole show that answers the question, does a bear shit in space?

• 0:09Chuck Nice?

  Yes, we did. And I'm just, I'm just upset that I didn't come up with that right there.

• 0:16Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just, we, we got animals on earth that hibernate. And if we're gonna send people through space, every sci fi story has a hibernating crew. And we finally found someone who's trying to solve that very problem.

• 0:27Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 0:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. Knowing that other mammals can do it, and we're a mammal, last I checked. So we went there on StarTalk Special Edition, coming up.

• 0:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Welcome to StarTalk, your place in the universe where science and pop culture collide.

• 0:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  StarTalk begins right now.

• 0:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk Special Edition. And since it's Special Edition, you know my two co-hosts, Chuck Nice. Chuck, how you doing, man?

• 0:59Chuck Nice?

  Hey, Neil, I'm doing great, thanks.

• 1:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And not only Chuck, we've got Gary O'Reilly. All right, Gary, welcome back.

• 1:05Gary O'Reilly?

  Thank you. Always a pleasure.

• 1:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Today's topic is like, whoa, how come we didn't do this 10 years ago? We're gonna talk about hibernation in space.

• 1:16Chuck Nice?

  Oh, don't sleep on this subject.

• 1:18Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, came in early.

• 1:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I want me some hibernation stories here. So Gary, set the scene here. What did you put together?

• 1:26Gary O'Reilly?

  We've all seen the sci fi movies where the crew are in some kind of deep sleep, hurtling through deep space. Um, but how is that going to be achieved? Turns out, we actually may have to look to Mother Nature for our answer. Animals can hibernate for months at a time, from little squirrels to big old bears. So if humans want to engage in interplanetary travel, they are most likely going to need to hibernate or enter a state of torpor. Can you get a non-hibernating animal, which is us humans, to hibernate? And for that, we are going to need an expert. Um, cue our guest, Ryan Springer, PhD.

• 2:09Gary O'Reilly?

  Senior Research Physiologist at Fauna Bio, a PhD in Zoology with expertise in cardio pulmonary physiology, also expertise in hibernation and extreme physiology, which I think is a vital component of his background and its effects on the cardiovascular system. Fauna Bio have been awarded a NASA grant through their NIAC program, which stands for NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts for a Study in Torper in Animals for Space Health or STASH. Plus, the most important thing is Ryan is a StarTalk fan, which makes him smart as well as cool.

• 2:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  We love it. Ryan, welcome to StarTalk.

• 2:53Speaker 03

  Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

• 2:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what is torper?

• 2:58Speaker 03

  That's a good question. What is torper? So, so we define torper in the field as a state of metabolic depression and body temperature depression. And so it's sort of this quiescent state where the body's been turned down.

• 3:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So depression in a biophysiological sense, not in a neurological sense?

• 3:17Speaker 03

  A little bit of biophysiological sense in its root, but you also have a neurophysiological depression.

• 3:21Chuck Nice?

  But not a depressive state as in an emotional...

• 3:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's all I mean.

• 3:26Speaker 03

  Yes, yes.

• 3:27Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah.

• 3:28Speaker 03

  So dialing down of the metabolism and the body temperature, essentially, the body pulling back.

• 3:33Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So what's the difference between torper and hibernation?

• 3:36Speaker 03

  This is a, this is a fun topic to discuss at the hibernation conferences that we hold every four years. But what the general field will say is hibernation is the season in which the animals will use torper. And so torper is the actual state in which the metabolism is low.

• 3:53Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Why do you have conferences only every four years? Are you hibernating in between?

• 3:57Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, precisely, precisely. Well, that's when good science gets done as well. Well, historically, it's taken longer to collect hibernation data because it's a seasonal event.

• 4:11Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, you only have a very limited window where you can study.

• 4:15Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:16Chuck Nice?

  You can't go, can't go up to a bear in the summertime, just like, hey, man, you tired?

• 4:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 4:22Gary O'Reilly?

  Mind you, you've got, you've got two hemispheres. Where winter is one time and in one and a different in others. So you might, I mean, it depends if you feel like picking up your bags and traveling.

• 4:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, actually, and that's why it was just this year, we decided to shorten that as a community. We decided to shorten that conference because we're learning that hibernation is not just a cold season event. We're learning recently that warm animals will hibernate. Uh, animals in warm climates will hibernate. They'll hibernate at warm temperatures. Um, so we're learning that, that it's more widespread than we thought.

• 4:55Chuck Nice?

  Why, why do they do it? What I mean, what is, what is the purpose of hibernation for, like, if I'm a bear, right? We, we all think of hibernation. We automatically think of bears. So I use them as an example. Well, why not just be awake all year long and, you know, go get some food and, or pack up on, uh, you know, calories like some other animals do and then get through the lean time. What's the idea of, you know, dialing yourself down metabolically and taking a long nap?

• 5:25Speaker 03

  You mentioned it almost in your question. It, it, it costs a lot to do things is, is a really simple way of putting it.

• 5:31Chuck Nice?

  Energetically.

• 5:32Speaker 03

  Energetically. It costs a lot energetically to do.

• 5:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm not thinking the bear's got, needs $20 in his wallet to get.

• 5:40Speaker 03

  No.

• 5:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Very costly to be a bear.

• 5:43Chuck Nice?

  Only you can prevent forest fires. Come on, help a brother out.

• 5:48Speaker 03

  Spare change. Yeah, energetically it costs a lot. And, and so even if you wanted to pack on all that extra weight and try to make it through a period of what we like to term resource deprivation. So this is a period where there's not as much water available. It's frozen or it's a drought. Um, and there's not a lot of food available because of that reason. And so in these periods of resource deprivation, some mammals have decided uh, over time to, to, instead of increasing supply, they decrease demand. And that demand being your, your metabolism that they're turning down.

• 6:19Chuck Nice?

  Oh my, that's, that, that scares me in a way, just because I think about the climate and how it's changing. And when you talk about matters of deprivation, you know, or lack of resources, you know, we might find a time where maybe those bears won't hibernate because the water won't be frozen. And then we've encroached upon their land and they they're like, hey, you guys, you guys are supplying us with food like, because you ever you ever see the videos of them tearing open a car to get to get to that picnic basket? You know, it's a little scary what you when you describe hibernation that way for those reasons.

• 6:57Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, bears are very strong animals. That is, that goes without saying. But yeah, climate change, actually, that's a big push in the field right now is to try to understand what climate change is going to do to hibernators, particularly the cold climate hibernators. Because again, we're seeing more and more warm climate hibernators. So we have an idea of what it might look like, but it is very different. So it's going to be a big change for a lot of these, a lot of these species.

• 7:20Gary O'Reilly?

  There has to be some positive benefit to hibernation. Otherwise, animals would have evolved not to do it.

• 7:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Most mammals don't do it.

• 7:31Gary O'Reilly?

  What are the benefits then to me, apart from getting a good nap?

• 7:35Speaker 03

  Yeah, it would be the dream if you could. Yeah, the benefit, as far as we can tell, is these, these animals that use it are more resilient to periods in which there suddenly is an availability of resources.

• 7:49Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 7:49Speaker 03

  And so a really great example of this actually is not in the northern hemisphere is where it's cold. It's the southern hemispheres in Australia where you have wildfires, big wildfires.

• 7:56Chuck Nice?

  Oh.

• 7:57Speaker 03

  And there's animals down there that after these periods of wildfire, where there's now suddenly no food for a while, they'll go into torpor. And so these animals are more resilient now because they don't need that food and they can survive a little bit longer. It can just kind of stretch what resources they currently have in their body.

• 8:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Well, cold blooded animals barely eat anyway, right? I mean, we always show alligators as being voracious eaters, but

• 8:21Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 8:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I mean, we eat a lot because we have to maintain our body temperature

• 8:25Speaker 03

  Look, look.

• 8:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  apart from the air temperature surrounding us. If they are the air temperature, then their their energy is for what? To run their brain? And if they want to just walk around a little bit?

• 8:35Speaker 03

  Exactly. So, yeah. And so you're exactly right. The cold-blooded animals, they don't eat a lot. Um, they can go, white long periods, alligators, I think, can go months to almost a year without eating. Yeah.

• 8:47Chuck Nice?

  Oh, my God.

• 8:48Speaker 03

  And I've got a funny anecdote about that from my old advisor, but.

• 8:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  There's nothing funny about a hungry alligator.

• 8:53Chuck Nice?

  I was about to say that.

• 8:54Speaker 03

  No, not at all. Um, not when you're around it, at least. Yeah.

• 8:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's, that's right.

• 9:00Speaker 03

  But yeah, they, they don't eat for, for long periods of time because they don't have to depend body temperature. So defending body temperature at a stable, uh, amount is very, it, it, it costs a lot of energy.

• 9:10Chuck Nice?

  So we're, we're expending energy all the time just to keep our body temperature at ninety-eight point six is what you're saying.

• 9:17Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 9:17Chuck Nice?

  That's, that's where all, so if you don't have that, I'll call it a problem, but if, if that's not necessary, then you're saving a lot of energy.

• 9:25Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You barely have to eat at all.

• 9:26Chuck Nice?

  Running to stand still.

• 9:27Speaker 03

  Barely have to do it all. Exactly.

• 9:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In fact, it's, it's, it's worse than that, uh, or better than that. You burn energy thermally, just by maintaining your body temperature, but you also burn energy kinetically, right? By like moving against gravity or just moving at all. Okay. Consider how long it would take your body to burn the calories of a cupcake just by existing. You will easily burn the calories of a cupcake just by watching television. You can do that. Okay.

• 10:00Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 10:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  But then say, what do I have to do on a treadmill to burn the calories of a cupcake? It's like, I'm not doing that.

• 10:06Chuck Nice?

  Right. Yeah. Cause that's like, that's damn near an hour of running.

• 10:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Exactly. Exactly. Thermal energy is a huge consumer of energy relative to kinetic energy. But Ryan, get back to your, to your answer there. If they're wildfires and they take out resources, you have to wait until the trees grow back and the bushes grow back. It seems to me that would require a much longer time than a typical hibernating bear. For the resources to return if they have to recover from a wildfire.

• 10:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, I would describe it more of a strategy to stretch how long you can maintain in that area. And so if you stay, if you stay active,

• 10:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Anything helps.

• 10:46Speaker 03

  You've got days, right? If you stay torpid, you've got months and they can stay in torpor. I mean, there's animals that, again, and these are in the northern hemispheres, but there's animals that can stay torpid for nine months of the year.

• 10:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh.

• 10:58Speaker 03

  And so it's quite a while and your, your, your primary growth or your secondary growth, I should say, your, your primary growth, sorry, that your first shrubbery where you can start to get things to eat like insects and, and berries if they're, if they're coming up in the, in those months, you could stretch yourself to get, to get to those, I would say, yeah.

• 11:24Speaker 04

  Hi, I'm Ernie Carducci from Columbus, Ohio. I'm here with my son Ernie because we listen to StarTalk every night and support StarTalk on Patreon.

• 11:34Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  This is StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

• 11:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So what does NASA want out of you here? And Fauna Bio, is that a company you started? What is Fauna Bio?

• 11:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's Fauna Bio is not a company I started. It was started by three really intelligent ladies. Katie, Linda and Ashley.

• 12:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I've never heard anyone say, my company was started by three stupid people. Okay.

• 12:06Speaker 03

  That's a good point. That's a good point. I just like to give them credit when it's due. They're, they're really incredible, incredible human beings. The company is based on the premise that a lot, a lot of drug development could be benefited by looking at animals that have extreme physiology or, or rather looking at animals that are good at defending against diseases that humans are afflicted with naturally. And so one of the models that we use quite regularly is a hibernating species called a 13 line ground squirrel. And that species is fantastic against things like diabetes, ischemia, reperfusion, for example. So this is after traumatic injury, loss of blood flow, loss of oxygen, you return that you get tissue damage.

• 12:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wait, you're saying the squirrel is resistant to diabetes?

• 12:50Speaker 03

  So at the, at the beginning of the hibernation period or before they start their hibernation season, they increase their body mass by over a hundred percent. Just adipose tissue. So let's say they weigh a hundred grams, they'll go to 250 grams. They've added 150 grams of just fat. And they become completely insulin resistant during that period. And by the time the end of the hibernation season comes around, they've reversed that insulin resistance and they're back to normal. It's a naturally reversible model of diabetes, essentially.

• 13:17Chuck Nice?

  That's insane.

• 13:19Speaker 03

  Yes, yes.

• 13:20Chuck Nice?

  That's so, I mean, why isn't everybody studying? I mean, diabetes is a huge, huge problem in this country. Huge.

• 13:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Right, so, so, so if, if we know we mammals are a branch of the tree of life. And so we have more in common with each other than either of us have with any other branch in the tree of life. Why can't we just genetically steal these DNA secrets in these animals? And then apply it to us for whatever, however we need. And is that what NASA is trying to get you to do for our future astronauts?

• 13:55Speaker 03

  Yes, yes, that, that is, that is what Fawn is trying to do using these extreme organisms. And, and, and hibernators aren't the only species that are extraordinary. There's a spiny mouse, for example, that has regenerative capabilities. So this is a mammal that can-

• 14:06Chuck Nice?

  Spiny mouse?

• 14:07Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 14:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Spiny?

• 14:08Speaker 03

  Spiny mouse that has regenerative-

• 14:09Chuck Nice?

  What are the regenerative capabilities, you know, per se?

• 14:13Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or we grow a tail or a leg, right?

• 14:15Speaker 03

  Uh, I don't know about a whole limb, but certainly tissue replacement. Um, so, so neural tissue replacement, skin, like normal tissue replacement, so skin.

• 14:23Gary O'Reilly?

  Is there not a chance for any mammal that hibernates for any length of time, losing muscle density?

• 14:31Speaker 03

  This is another remarkable, uh, aspect of the hibernating species that have been studied to date. They don't. So, so, yeah, so this is incredible. This is, and this is where NASA is interested. This is where we get into NASA, yeah. So, so if you break your arm, i- i- if you break your arm, your leg, you go into a cast for however many months that you have on. You take it off, your arms are different sizes. You've lost muscle mass, that's, that's disuse atrophy is what it's called.

• 14:56Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm old enough to remember the old days where you were encouraged to not use the limb at all. There were no walking casts. There was no exercises you would do. And I'd say I had friends who broke, broke limbs and they took off the cast. It was like the, the limbs of two different people on the same body.

• 15:13Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah, and and hibernators don't do that. It's incredible.

• 15:18Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 15:19Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 15:20Chuck Nice?

  But you always see in the nature shows where the animal comes out of hibernation and then, sir, what's his name? I forget. And he's just like, and now the feverish search for food begins. Like, they immediately. How dare you forget Sir David Attenborough's name? That's his name, Sir David Attenborough. Yes, exactly.

• 15:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's why he's a brat. We're allowed to forget.

• 15:43Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, well, no, he's beloved everywhere. He's not even like, the whole world owns that guy. That's why I couldn't remember his name because everybody knows. So you're saying that the weight loss is not muscle density. It's.

• 15:57Speaker 03

  Correct.

• 15:58Chuck Nice?

  So they put on fat and then all they do is their body eats the fat.

• 16:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yep.

• 16:03Chuck Nice?

  Oh, because our body eats muscle.

• 16:06Speaker 03

  For muscle first.

• 16:07Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, our body eats muscle first.

• 16:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Ryan, why don't you fix us?

• 16:11Speaker 03

  Actually, we we just Fonda just signed a really awesome partnership with Eli Lilly, trying to fix that. Yes, we're doing that. We're actively looking at that, actually. We're looking for new obesity targets to try to see how it is that we can change, we can say, have our metabolism say, yeah, we want to just consume adipose. We don't want to consume protein. We don't want to consume carbohydrates.

• 16:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You want to have your metabolism and eat it too.

• 16:34Speaker 03

  Exactly. Yeah, that's what we want to do. Yeah.

• 16:36Gary O'Reilly?

  Ryan, in in our research, we came across a nugget of information that is worrying and amazing in the same breath. How did we find out that hibernating animals have a level of protection from radiation?

• 16:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, this started in the early 50s. I think 51 was the first study that looked at irradiating hibernators. And so they basically gave them huge doses of gamma radiation. And what they learned was that these hibernating species survived the radiation far better than a rat, for example. And it particularly increased their their their protection against the radiation increased if they were in torpor.

• 17:21Speaker 03

  And so, so these species are uniquely protected against radiation. The study started in the early 50s. We still have not a great idea of why.

• 17:29Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  It's not because the fat absorbs the gamma rays, is it?

• 17:32Speaker 03

  No, we think it has to do with reactive oxygen species.

• 17:35Gary O'Reilly?

  Please explain that, what that is.

• 17:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, reactive oxygen species are, well, I guess I'm not a chemist. So I couldn't tell you exactly what a reactive oxygen species is, but it's a product of your metabolism. And so these, these reactive oxygen species, they, as, as the term suggests, they react with oxygen. They cause all sorts of bad stuff to happen in your tissue, damage, tissue damage essentially. And so when, when radiation comes in and hits a hydrogen, so like a proton comes in and hits a hydrogen or interacts with oxygen, it creates these reactive oxygen species that damage your body. And so if you've ever been to the store and everybody, the craze right now is antioxidants. If you've seen that in the store and your food, that's, that's, they're designed to counteract reactive oxygen species source.

• 18:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm not anti anything, by the way.

• 18:17Speaker 03

  That's fair. And so that's where we think a lot of the protection is coming from is because these animals are really good at natural antioxidants. So they have them during the torpid state. But also with the, with the reduction of metabolism, you get a reduction of the mitochondrial function. You get less oxygen in these tissues as well as less water. So there's less things for that radiation to interact with and create these reactive oxygen species.

• 18:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So, so with less things, you mean there's less active biology to disrupt? Is that a way to say that?

• 18:47Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 18:48Chuck Nice?

  And do the animals come out of hibernation after being radiated with gamma rays going like bears, smash?

• 18:54Speaker 03

  What do you need? No, no.

• 18:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The bear doesn't have to become whole.

• 18:59Gary O'Reilly?

  I do not want any one of my gamma rays at a bloody bear. Do not want that going green and Hulk.

• 19:04Speaker 03

  Don't, yeah. I don't, the chance is small, but it's big enough.

• 19:09Chuck Nice?

  So now when, when squirrels go and they, they're not hibernating then? They just fill their layer with nuts and stay in for the winter and eat? Is that the deal or are they actually hibernating too?

• 19:22Speaker 03

  So the ones that everybody's seen in their life, the tree squirrels, big bushy tails, they don't hibernate. You're right, they, they, they're, they're food caching animals. So instead of, instead of turning down demand, they store away supply essentially for the winter.

• 19:34Gary O'Reilly?

  So I can't sneak up on them during winter and get them?

• 19:38Speaker 03

  No, unfortunately not.

• 19:39Gary O'Reilly?

  There goes that, there goes that theory.

• 19:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The squirrel is different from poking the bear.

• 19:43Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's very true.

• 19:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So there's no understanding biologically why?

• 19:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  A hibernating mammal would have more radiative resistance. It's not clear why that would be so evolutionarily, is that right?

• 19:59Speaker 03

  That's a really great point. There's, there really seems to be no reason evolutionarily why they would act. I shouldn't say actively, but why that trait might be selected for. So it's probably a passive consequence of some other thing that they've been defending against. Uh, with the physiology of hibernation or torpor, I should say. So sort of accidentally becoming more protected against radiation is, is how I describe it.

• 20:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  All right. So, so where does this go? You're trying to help NASA at least for Mars, Mars missions where you, it's nine months there and nine months back and, and two years on planet. Are there specific missions they're tasking you to think about?

• 20:36Speaker 03

  So right now we're in the phase, conceptual phase of NIAC. There's three phases conceptual. Phase two is more, you make the concept come to life and phase three is sort of flight mission. Uh, we're in the conceptual design. NASA has, uh, turns its attention towards trying to figure out the hazards of space. Because with the Mars missions planned coming up, they don't have really a good answer for things like radiation. Disuse, atrophy, lengthy stay in space essentially. And so they started to drive down different ways to, to mitigate this. And one of the ways that they've been really interested in is hibernation. And so our unit, what we're designing with NIAC right now is actually just the ability for the first time in human history to study hibernation in space. Because we don't even know if hibernation will work in space.

• 21:21Speaker 03

  Nobody's even thought to, to send a hibernating animal up and say, does it happen?

• 21:25Gary O'Reilly?

  Are there any primates that hibernate? Because I'm thinking theoretically, if there are, then that might be possible for humans.

• 21:32Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They'd be even closer to us in the tree of life.

• 21:33Gary O'Reilly?

  Right. Rather than trying to think about how we, we work a bear or a squirrel or whatever it might be.

• 21:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Or a mouse.

• 21:39Chuck Nice?

  Uh, there is one primate, uh, my son.

• 21:43Speaker 03

  That makes two primates then at least.

• 21:47Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, there is. Okay.

• 21:48Speaker 03

  There is that there are. So fat-tailed lemurs from Madagascar, they will use torpor. Quite, quite well, actually. Um, so there is a, a more related species to us that will, that can use hibernation.

• 22:00Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Is this during ski season in Madagascar? I mean, when would they?

• 22:04Speaker 03

  Drought, drought is the big one for Madagascar.

• 22:06Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Drought.

• 22:07Speaker 03

  Yeah. Yeah. So during the dry periods.

• 22:09Gary O'Reilly?

  What chance is there that we share? Part of that code that will allow us as humans.

• 22:16Speaker 03

  We think actually a pretty good chance. So if you look evolutionarily, it seems that hibernation is a pretty basal condition, a pretty, and what I mean by basal is it's pretty far down in the tree of life.

• 22:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Deep in the tree of life.

• 22:30Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 22:30Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So you wouldn't have to gene splice it, you would just have to gene enable it.

• 22:34Chuck Nice?

  Unlock it.

• 22:35Speaker 03

  That's what we're thinking. Yeah, that's what we're thinking.

• 22:37Chuck Nice?

  Mm hmm. Interesting. So now, how do we know physiologically how they, because you know, without water, we die very quickly. So what is happening physiologically? Are they storing water? Do their cells just retain it? I mean, what's going on? Do we know?

• 22:56Speaker 03

  Yeah, we have an idea. Yeah, they recycle.

• 22:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They have a photo machine in the back.

• 23:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 23:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No one's ever been deep into a bear cave to deny that story.

• 23:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's true. Well, actually, I might know somebody who has been.

• 23:10Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Used to know someone who did.

• 23:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, used to. That's a good point.

• 23:14Chuck Nice?

  I mean, specifically with the Madagascar fat tail, because they're primates. And so, like I said, we die very quickly without water. So what's going on with them?

• 23:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, that unfortunately, we don't know.

• 23:24Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 23:25Speaker 03

  It's, they're incredibly endangered species. So more invasive studies on them are just, they just don't happen. So what we can do is whole animal physiology or survival physiology, but we can't really tell cellularly what's going on with the watering levers. Now, we can infer from other hibernating species. And we know that they're really good at recycling the water that they do have. So there's a change in renal function, essentially, that allows them to recycle a little bit better.

• 23:47Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Means they don't eat, they don't pee the whole time?

• 23:50Speaker 03

  They don't eat, they don't drink, they don't pee, they don't poop. It's a complete shutdown in metabolism.

• 23:55Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 23:56Speaker 03

  And everything that comes from it. And so.

• 23:58Gary O'Reilly?

  What bodily system, what brain system is controlling all of this? Because it can't just be and that's it. Something's got to still be going on to control this.

• 24:09Speaker 03

  Yeah, there's tissues that are still active. So there are neural tissues that are still active. Generally speaking, the cortex is quite quiescent. So it's, there's not a lot going on in the cortex. The neural tissue that we see going on is coming from either the brain, well, both the brainstem and the hypothalamus. So brainstem's controlling all heart rate, respiratory rate, things like that, keeping your blood moving, even though it's moving more slowly. And your lungs functioning. Obviously, with that, there's muscles that do stay active, like the diaphragm, some of the upper respiratory muscles will stay active. Um, the hypothalamus, I don't know if you've, if you've read about this tissue before. It's basically one of the main tissues controlling metabolism and body temperature. And so they are regulating really tightly where their metabolism at is at and where their

• 24:54Speaker 03

  body temperature is at with the hypothalamus. So that tissues are being active as well. And that's actually in and of itself really interesting because you have tissues that are functioning in a mammal at four degrees Celsius, which is something that a human couldn't do right now. We couldn't bring a human down to four degrees Celsius and ask those tissues to continue to work. You'd get complete neural failure. And so they've, they've developed or evolved these ways to maintain tissue function despite it being really cold.

• 25:22Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Man, this sounds like sci-fi. It's so cool. Like it's, that's amazing. Yeah. So can I, can we get quantitative here? So my basal metabolism, so just keeping my body temperature for 24 hours, I run through between 2,200 and 2,400 calories. Not for a man your size. Well, for me, yeah. Nah. Yeah. Come on, man. What are you saying? You too big to be living on those 2,000 calories. Get out of here. I didn't say 2,000, I said 2,400, 22, 20, around there. Okay. All right. If you say so, I mean, if that makes you comfortable. Let me live in my own lie.

• 26:02Speaker 03

  When he's watching TV, when he's watching.

• 26:04Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Okay. So if I'm in one of these hybrid native states, what does my calorie needs drop to?

• 26:09Speaker 03

  If you're in the hiberning state, so it, it depends on what.

• 26:12Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Let's use round numbers, just call it 2,000. So now what?

• 26:16Speaker 03

  It depends on what depth of hibernation we achieve. So if you're.

• 26:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Total depth.

• 26:20Speaker 03

  Total, for the deepest, deepest depth, you would be down in the tenths of a calorie. So it's about a nine per day.

• 26:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Per day? What? From 2,000 down to less than one calorie per day?

• 26:33Speaker 03

  So the deepest hibernators that we've seen, they'll, they'll reduce metabolism by about 99%, a little bit more than 99%.

• 26:38Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Wow. Damn.

• 26:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's insane. Okay, but that's still, that way. I want this so bad. I want this so badly.

• 26:49Speaker 03

  And the, and that metabolism that's going, it's only adipose.

• 26:52Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Just to be clear. Ninety-nine percent drop on 2,000 calories is 20 calories.

• 26:59Speaker 03

  Oh, okay. Yeah, you're right. I'm bad at math, I suppose.

• 27:01Gary O'Reilly?

  Okay.

• 27:02Speaker 03

  Um, but I did say it's more than 99%. It would be nearing the single digits of calories is what you would expect.

• 27:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That is crazy.

• 27:11Gary O'Reilly?

  Okay, so to Chuck's point, how can you induce a state of torp? Because you can't just say, right, lie down there and don't think about calories.

• 27:22Speaker 03

  Things have got to happen. Put it out of your mind.

• 27:24Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, just, just forget about it.

• 27:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Put it to a meditation tape, you're halfway there.

• 27:28Gary O'Reilly?

  And how long do you expect a human to be able to go in a state of torp? Because, you know, you still got that squirrel that did nine months. Is that viable for a human?

• 27:41Speaker 03

  Well, to answer your first question, how do we get so naturally, there's a lot of circadian rhythm that's associated with it. So the light cycle will kind of tell these animals where they should be. Obviously, there's the facultative side of it, which is basically means as soon as the food is taken away, that tells them, I should go into hibernation. So your pet hamster, if you've ever heard the stories of people walking in on their thought-dead hamster, that's a facultative hibernator. So that trigger for them is the food's gone away, I must hibernate now. So they'll go into torpor. And so there's different ways of doing it. We're actually getting really good at, over the last 10 years, we're getting really good at taking animals that shouldn't be in hibernation and putting them into hibernation.

• 28:17Speaker 03

  And so rats, for example, are a prime example of this. We can go in and we can change things in the hypothalamus to make them drop metabolism and drop body temperature to look like they're in torpor.

• 28:29Gary O'Reilly?

  You take food away from a human, they get hangry.

• 28:32Speaker 03

  They, yeah, very hangry. Yeah.

• 28:34Gary O'Reilly?

  So you've got to, so you're going to have to possibly chemically induce this.

• 28:38Speaker 03

  Yeah, there's probably some chemical induction that will be involved in that process. Yeah.

• 28:43Chuck Nice?

  When you talk about the circadian rhythm of human beings, it's pretty particular. So, you know, you put somebody to sleep for a couple of months. There's gonna be a huge adjustment period when they come out of that. I mean, you want to talk about being disoriented and like, and now they're up in space on top of that.

• 29:04Speaker 03

  It's a lot of stuff to throw at.

• 29:05Chuck Nice?

  Seems like a lock, man.

• 29:07Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  People get really hangry for less.

• 29:09Speaker 03

  That's true. What we learned, though, is that that circadian clock in the hibernators, it actually continues to function in torpor but more slowly because the metabolism is slower. And so the same amount of time has elapsed in the circadian clock, despite it being a month versus a day, for example. And so that might help with that disorientation.

• 29:49Gary O'Reilly?

  We bring it back to earth just temporarily. If a bear comes out of torpor, it has a reboot. What if that reboot doesn't quite work 100%?

• 30:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah.

• 30:01Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, all the organs have to go back to 100%.

• 30:03Gary O'Reilly?

  When you're in space and a human's gonna come out and the reboot doesn't quite...

• 30:07Speaker 03

  This is something that the movies don't get right.

• 30:09Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, it's the only thing that movies don't get right.

• 30:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, the only thing, everything. The other thing is we can't freeze people. That's gone out the window a few years ago. It's incredibly taxing to come out of hibernation. It's actually the most physiologically demanding part of hibernation, I would argue, because everything has to come online in the correct order. So the heart can't bump too fast before the peripheral tissues are ready. You can't inflate the lung too much because it's still cold, so you could break alveoli. So there's, and so there's an incredibly coordinated event of these animals coming out of hibernation. So that process is actually quite slow. In a rodent, it could take as long as an hour or two to come out.

• 30:53Speaker 03

  In a human, in a bear, it's a little bit less because their body temperature started a little higher, the metabolic rate's a little higher, they don't go as deep into hibernation. But it still takes time and it's dangerous.

• 31:02Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  At the beginning of Austin Powers, where they brought him out of deep freeze and they thawed him out, he peed for like three minutes.

• 31:13Gary O'Reilly?

  At no point was that for comedic effect.

• 31:17Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  I'm just saying, we all pee like a lot when you wake up in the morning.

• 31:20Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah.

• 31:21Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And this was obviously a, an extension of that. So I'm still wondering how you pee, if you're not gonna pee when you hibernate, you're gonna, you're gonna have a big ass pee when you wake up out of that, no?

• 31:32Speaker 03

  Well, maybe. And, and I know, I know from experience, there's not a lot of urine after the hibernation period. Not, not that I hibernated, I, I've seen it in these animals.

• 31:44Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Chuck, he slipped up.

• 31:47Gary O'Reilly?

  That's really gonna have an effect on the kidneys and the kidney function.

• 31:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, renal function is, is quite, quite dramatically changed in hibernation. But, but yeah, the, the bladders aren't full at the end of hibernation period. They, they don't urinate. And so it has a lot to do with the recycling of that water, but also the reduction in metabolism. So you're just not using as much of that water as well. You know, in sleep, you're, you're still quite metabolically active in sleep.

• 32:10Gary O'Reilly?

  For an animal that doesn't naturally hibernate, say a human, coming out of hibernation, a torpor, if it's not programmed naturally to get it right, it could go cataclysmically wrong.

• 32:26Speaker 03

  Certainly could, yeah, yep.

• 32:28Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, what a great thought.

• 32:30Chuck Nice?

  Is the closest thing to torpor for a human being going into a coma? And would there be any benefit in sustaining us the same way we sustain people who are put into like a medically induced coma or like?

• 32:44Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's a great thought, actually. I, I would argue the closest state to hibernation that, that humans achieve is actually sleep. What we're thinking is that hibernation is an extension of sleep. But I, but I will, I will squash the, the media mistake. Hibernation isn't sleep, actually, they don't sleep in hibernation. In fact, it seems that they come out of hibernation to sleep. But they're not sleeping when they're in torpor. But everything physiologically speaking in sleep is very similar to hibernation, except it's just far deeper in hibernation. But you're exactly right. I think, I think what human hibernation is gonna look like is some sort of assisted state. Because we're not natural at it right now. And it, there's a lot of, a lot of hurdles that we'll have to overcome

• 33:27Speaker 03

  to get to the point where we can just induce hibernation in a person and then have them come out by themselves. I think in the meantime, it will have to be some sort of assisted state where we're maintaining fluids or nutrient balance at the right level, a whole host of things, really.

• 33:42Chuck Nice?

  How close are we to this being real?

• 33:44Speaker 03

  That's a great question. We don't know. I, you know, it's certainly not a five years sort of thing that we can get humans into hibernation. But, you know, maybe are we looking in closer to 10, 15 years? I would say realistically.

• 33:57Chuck Nice?

  Are you the first volunteer?

• 33:59Speaker 03

  I would happily. Actually, there's a lab, there's a lab with some massive funding as well, trying to extend the depth of metabolic depression in humans, or reduction in humans, I should say, from sleep using, using chemicals. And that's the closest I think we are right now to getting humans just into a more metabolically lowered state. So we're already starting to cross that starting line, I would say, to getting humans closer to a metabolically lowered state.

• 34:27Gary O'Reilly?

  Can we jumpstart that by gene therapy?

• 34:32Speaker 03

  Jumpstart the entrance into like a torpid state, you mean?

• 34:36Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah. Can we give the upgrades to the areas that we, that we, because I'm on the team now, that you know are really necessary for these things to be in the right place and go in the right direction?

• 34:50Speaker 03

  I think we're going to need to do that. I just, what we don't know yet is exactly where to put those jumper cables.

• 34:57Gary O'Reilly?

  All right.

• 34:58Speaker 03

  Where's the right spot to be making these changes? To do it, to go into a torpid state more reliably? We know the hypothalamus is going to be important to this endeavor. We know that, that changes there are going to be key. But we don't know exactly where in the hypothalamus yet.

• 35:13Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 35:14Speaker 03

  But there's a lot of problems with it that come with just depressing metabolism and lowering body temperature and things like that. There's a lot of problems that we'll have to solve at the same time.

• 35:21Chuck Nice?

  And what about, because we talked about the cast and the atrophy, so muscle atrophy? Even if we just sit around, so, you know, just the fact that we're not exercising, which is what our bodies are kind of made to do. So how do you combat the muscle atrophy associated with being asleep for a couple of months?

• 35:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, that's one of the big problems that we're going to have to face. And that's why studying hibernators, natural hibernators, I think is going to be key to figuring that question out. We don't know, really. What we know is that it's a balance between protein degradation and protein synthesis. That's really where the muscle tissue balance comes from. It's either you increase synthesis to maintain tissue, or you decrease degradation. And what we see in the hibernators is they actually do a little bit of both in torpor. So they'll decrease their degradation pathways and they'll increase their synthesis pathways. So they're actually making a little bit of new muscle, too, in the hibernation season. And so what we have to figure out from them is what is it that they're doing to maintain both of those sort of at a higher level? And the answer to that is just, we don't know.

• 36:31Chuck Nice?

  You wouldn't be able to use one of those like electronic muscle stimulators that you see advertised in the back of the magazines, like, you know, put this on, you'll have six-pack abs in three weeks.

• 36:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, force muscle contraction. It's probably not the way I would go. I think there's a more sophisticated way of doing it. But that's more or less what, like, for example, an astronaut has to do is without the electronic stimulation, they have to basically weight train or resistance train.

• 36:57Chuck Nice?

  Resistance, yeah.

• 36:58Speaker 03

  A lot of the time that they're in space is because they have to sort of combat that microgravity, that saying, that's not giving the muscle cues to stay full of tissue. They'll start to degrade.

• 37:08Chuck Nice?

  All right, this is a question for Neil, because you just made me think of it. So I'm sorry that I'm directing attention away. But you just said, in space, they weight train. So the weights don't have any weight in, or, you know what I mean? Resistance. It's that way. Springs.

• 37:27Chuck Nice?

  Ah, okay. Like the rubber bands. Okay, okay.

• 37:30Gary O'Reilly?

  All right, let's leapfrog to a positive future, Ryan. Say you are able to induce a state of torpor. We're in a spacecraft, we're going interplanetary. What are the logistics that we will need? Is it a nice cozy bed? Are you going to be slopping around in amniotic fluid? What do we need? We need oxygen? We need to be consideration of the CO2 that we're expelling? Hydration, all these other things. What are the logistics that we need to be coming to terms with?

• 38:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, I well.

• 38:06Chuck Nice?

  I need a Tempur-Pedic mattress, okay? There you go. I'm just letting you know.

• 38:09Speaker 03

  Retrofit the pods with a Tempur-Pedic mattress.

• 38:11Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 38:12Speaker 03

  Yeah, I've liked watching movies in the sense of there's a lot of creativity with what they sort of make these pods look like.

• 38:18Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  If you're weightless, you won't need a mattress.

• 38:21Speaker 03

  That's got to point you out, yeah.

• 38:23Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They advertise, we are used by NASA.

• 38:25Chuck Nice?

  Yes, they do.

• 38:26Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  In space. And you only need it for the eight minutes you're going into.

• 38:30Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 38:31Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And the rest of the time you're weightless, it doesn't matter if there's a mattress there at all.

• 38:35Chuck Nice?

  That's true, because the depression that is from the takeoff, and that's it.

• 38:39Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  That's it.

• 38:40Chuck Nice?

  Yeah. So what are they sleeping in space?

• 38:43Gary O'Reilly?

  Space.

• 38:43Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Space.

• 38:46Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  No, they have these little sleeping bags that they slide in.

• 38:49Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 38:49Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Keeps them warm, yeah.

• 38:51Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 38:51Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Could I interrupt it?

• 38:52Speaker 03

  Keeps them from floating around, although it's totally fine.

• 38:54Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, especially keeps you floating around into somebody else's.

• 38:56Speaker 03

  Well, to that same token, I think, I think someone in a torpid-like state in space is going to need some sort of sequestering environment, so like a pod, kind of like what you would see in the movies. And I would, I would say, yeah, CO2 is probably my main concern when it comes to hibernation. Once you have that lowered metabolic rate, O2 becomes less of a concern. Obviously, you still need it, but you don't need as much, but CO2 will still eventually build up. So you're going to have to sequester CO2 away or recycle it into O2. I think that humans are going to need some sort of supportive fluids. And, and the real question is, what, what is the hibernation going to look like? Because in natural hibernation, they don't just go into torpor and stay in torpor. They actually go into torpor and they periodically spontaneously come out of torpor for about 24 hours. And nobody has any idea why.

• 39:39Speaker 03

  And then they go back in and they just repeat that cycle throughout the entire hibernation season.

• 39:42Chuck Nice?

  It's like us waking up in the middle of the night.

• 39:44Speaker 03

  Exactly.

• 39:45Gary O'Reilly?

  What's the timeline on that, that cycle?

• 39:47Speaker 03

  Depending on the species, so on the, on the, on the most robust hibernators, like the 13-line ground squirrel, they'll stay in that torpor period for about 20-ish days. And then they'll arouse spontaneously, go into this, what we call interbout arousal. And they'll stay in that between 12 and 24 hours, and then they'll go back into torpor for that about 20 days. And when they come out of hibernation, that's actually when they sleep during the hibernation season. So they still, it seems that they still must sleep like all other mammals.

• 40:15Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Oh, the sleeping, which we've always heard about as a neurological necessity.

• 40:20Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 40:20Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  What you're saying is whatever's going on in hibernation does not serve the body's needs that we get from sleeping.

• 40:27Speaker 03

  Precisely.

• 40:27Chuck Nice?

  Interesting.

• 40:28Speaker 03

  So you still have to come out and sleep.

• 40:29Chuck Nice?

  Maybe the.

• 40:32Chuck Nice?

  Cycle of torpor for humans might be a little different where we're in torpor for four days and then we come out for three days instead of being in for a month. And, you know, is that feasible?

• 40:48Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Our formula might be different.

• 40:51Speaker 03

  Yeah, our formula, I think our formula will certainly be different. And actually, the bear is a prime example of why our formula would be different. Bears don't have the interbararosals. And so there is some sleep associated with their torpor like state. And that's why we think it's more of this continuum from sleep to deep torpor is that bears sort of are on the closer to the sleep side, where they don't need these interbararosals. So they must be sleeping in some fashion in their torpor hibernation season. And so I suspect humans will fall on that side. They'll be look more like a bear.

• 41:19Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Do you participate in the fat bear photo contest?

• 41:23Speaker 03

  I don't, but I and I'm just hearing of this now. So I think I might have to.

• 41:28Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, every fall, I think it is that people put they get, you know, whoever's in the wilderness, they get the fattest bear photo they possibly can.

• 41:37Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 41:37Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And there's some fat ass bears.

• 41:39Speaker 03

  Oh, they get really big. Yeah.

• 41:41Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  They get, oh my God.

• 41:42Speaker 03

  So all adipose tissue is what they're putting on too.

• 41:44Chuck Nice?

  It's all what?

• 41:45Speaker 03

  All fat tissue. That's what they put. It's all fat.

• 41:48Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, Ryan, at some point, you're gonna want to test on a little, well, say a little furry creature and send them into space. Tell me it's not.

• 41:57Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Last I saw you, your chest hair, you would count as a furry creature.

• 42:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah.

• 42:02Gary O'Reilly?

  I guess. However, you're not suggesting you send a big old bear up into space.

• 42:07Speaker 03

  No, no. I mean, in reality, that would be the most informative thing to put into space would be the bear, because I think that's what human hibernation is going to look like. But I don't think that's ever going to happen in the near future.

• 42:21Gary O'Reilly?

  Imagine it wakes up grumpy.

• 42:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, imagine.

• 42:24Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  You know, just to for a reality check here, the only difference between a bear in a cave and a bear in space is that a bear in space is weightless unless the spacecraft spins up and creates artificial gravity. If it creates artificial gravity, then the difference between a bear in space and a bear in a cave is zero. There is no difference, other than like, there's no salmon swimming by. So what are we actually testing for? Is it just the zero G effect?

• 42:53Speaker 03

  Yeah, well, so zero G and radiation, those are the two things that you're really not getting on Earth that you will be getting in space. Now, this is outside of low Earth orbit, obviously.

• 43:03Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah, yeah. Just for to be clear, when you're in low Earth orbit, you're still shielded by Earth's magnetic field, a lot of the high energy rays. If you're going to go to anywhere other than low Earth orbit, you have a radiation dose that will matter to you. And of course, if you're more radiatively resistant in hibernation state, then it all works out. So maybe all of the radiatively resistant hibernating animals came from space.

• 43:38Speaker 03

  In that line of thinking, that makes sense, yeah.

• 43:40Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  The aliens brought them, and the ones that didn't survive the radiation, they died. The ones that did came to Earth. There it is.

• 43:50Chuck Nice?

  That's the newest thing. And that's your next Pixar movie. Bunch of space animals here.

• 43:57Speaker 03

  I'd watch it. I'd watch it. Just to see.

• 43:59Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  So Ryan, we got to, we got to call it quits there. But this has been a highly illuminating conversation. I'm delighted to learn that we got top people working on this. I've always been jealous of other animals. People say, oh, the human body is some perfection. No, it's not. There's plenty of other animals that have features that I would delight in that we don't, among them regenerating limbs, hibernation, it sounds like fun if you just want to chill for a couple of months, all of this. So I'm glad to know we got good people such as yourself and your three leaders tackling these kinds of biomedical challenges.

• 44:35Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  And applying them to NASA. This is all great to learn here.

• 44:38Speaker 03

  Thank you so much for having me. It's been a really great time talking to all of you. And hopefully it was a fun conversation for everybody.

• 44:45Neil deGrasse Tyson?

  Yeah. Absolutely, man. Gary, always good to have you, man. Thank you, Neil. Always a pleasure, my friend. All right, Chuck E. Baby. You know it. Neil deGrasse Tyson here, closing out yet another edition of StarTalk Special Edition. This one on hibernating in space. As always, I bid you to keep looking up.