"We are designing a special type of plasticware test tube that is used to optimize fluid dynamics in space. Using a 3D printer, we're designing test tubes and submitting them to the SERA fluid dynamics competition." - Lucy Taylor, TS:14:10

Even as the commercial space industry has made it easier to send humans to space, the work being done to keep astronauts alive is relatively unstudied — opening the door for private initiatives that blend government priorities with commercial interests.

In the coming years, an unprecedented number of people will leave planet Earth—but it’s becoming increasingly clear that deep space will make us sick.

This past November, the University of Austin hosted their Inaugural SOMA Summit to explore the amazing transformation in space right now, especially how the commercial space era is decentralizing access. I [Jason Scharf] had the privilege to moderate a fascinating panel titled "Science in the Commercial Space Age" featuring Chris Sembroski from Blue Origin, along with University of Florida space biologists Dr. Rob Ferl and Dr. Anna-Lisa Paul.

UATX hosted the 1st Annual SOMA Astronaut Summit at our campus in downtown Austin on November 16, 2024. The first of its kind ever held in the U.S., the summit gathered participants of the Space Omics and Medical Atlas (SOMA), a collaborative initiative dedicated to standardizing biological metrics and advancing data sharing in astronaut health research. The event—a brainchild of Dr. Overbey—effectively announced UATX’s presence in the burgeoning Texas aerospace ecosystem.

Space is becoming our next great innovation frontier as we move from 700 astronauts spending days or months to tens of thousands spending years. What does that do to the human body? What does it mean for our species? Eliah Overbey, Assistant Professor of Bioastronautics at the University of Austin, joins the podcast to explore topics in the increasingly blurred line between science fiction and science fact.

As part of the Forging the Future: Innovating Access to the Cosmos speaker series, Sam Gebre, NASA’s Open Science Data Repository (OSDR) Project Manager, delivered a keynote presentation that underscored OSDR’s critical contributions to the space exploration ecosystem.

SERA has teamed with Christopher Mason, a Weill Cornell Medicine genomics professor, and Eliah Overbey, a University of Austin bioastronautics assistant professor. The pair will design the guidelines, run online tutorials, list the flight-approved materials, and curate the finalist proposals before public voting, which will feature on SERA’s website and social media.

Interview with Assistant Professor of Bioastronautics, Eliah Overbey

An Indian citizen-astronaut will now aid in conducting biomedical experiments to study the effects of microgravity on human physiology, cell biology, and fluid dynamics in space and help discover crucial information for future space missions. The US-based Space Exploration & Research Agency (SERA) on Friday announced that it has partnered with Weill Cornell Medicine and the University of Austin (UATX)-- institutions that predominantly work in space research– for the upcoming Blue Origin mission, founded by Jeff Bezos.

Research partnerships with the Mason Lab at Weill Cornell Cornell Medicine and the Overbey Lab at UATX invite community-driven experiments on an upcoming Blue Origin mission

Over the past few weeks, Overbey led sample collection and analysis for two additional commercial space missions: the SpaceX Polaris Dawn mission earlier in September and Blue Origin’s eighth human spaceflight in August.

What space travel tells us about ageing

CARLSON: "Eliah said the SOMA database helps us get closer to that kind of care for individual astronauts and for civilians who are interested in things like commercial space travel."

Less than 100 women have been to space, whereas more than 600 men have been. More data is needed to confirm what researchers say is early evidence that female astronauts return to their biological baseline quicker after returning to Earth.

Overbey’s research leads to '10-fold increase' in publicly available space health data. Her research has been profiled in more than a dozen major news outlets.

An extensive examination of medical data gathered from the private Inspiration4 mission in 2021 revealed temporary cognitive declines and genetic changes in the crew.

A comprehensive suite of biomedical data, collected during the first all-civilian spaceflight, is helping researchers unpick the effects that being in orbit has on the human body.

This monumental achievement was made possible through the collaborative efforts of over 100 institutions from more than 25 countries.

In-depth studies include first health data collected from space tourists

Women appear to withstand the rigors of zero gravity better than men, report says.

Dr. Overbey's most recent projects have analyzed genomic changes in astronauts from the SpaceX Inspiration4 mission, and she is currently working on data analysis and sample collection for the Axiom-2 and Polaris Dawn missions.