NASA's Artemis missions, which aim to send a human crew — including a woman and a person of color — to the moon by 2025, will shoot female dummies into space first to test the effects of radiation on them.
This summer, the first of three planned Artemis missions is expected to launch into orbit — not with humans, but with "two identical ‘phantoms’ representative of the female body,"The dummies, nicknamed Helga and Zohar, will include "more than 10,000 passive sensors and 34 active radiation detectors," said the German Aerospace Center, or DLR.
The mannequins will "investigate radiation exposure throughout the flight, which may last up to six weeks."The German agency says the twin mannequins are "modeled on female bodies" and made from "materials that mimic human bones, soft tissues and organs of adult women." Women are at greater risk of cancer than men, "so different radiation boundary values always apply to female astronauts," the DLR said.Helga will fly to the moon unprotected, while Zohar will wear a newly developed radiation vest called the AstroRad.Solving the radiation problem will help NASA with its long-term goal of getting humans to Mars. Outside of the Earth's protective shield, human bodies are far more vulnerable to the harmful effects of radiation.
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