Helga and Zohar are traveling to the moon on an important mission to measure radiation risk for female astronauts for the first time The inanimate combination is an adult female manikin. During the Artemis 1 mission, an unmanned Orion capsule will travel to the moon and return, and one of the mannequins will be equipped with a newly developed radiation protection vest.
People called Helga and Zohar will not be alone because they will collect data on Flight Acceleration and vibration with a third manikin. Artemis 1 is scheduled to launch later this year. The Artemis Project aims to send humans back to the moon for the first time in more than 50 years, but this time NASA vowed to land the first woman on the dusty lunar surface. Women seem to be at greater risk of harmful effects of space radiation, so their radiation boundary levels are different from those of their male colleagues. Studies of radiation exposure to men and women have shown that women are more likely to develop cancer, while other studies have found that space radiation is likely to affect women's reproductive health.
Helga and Zohar mannequins are part of the mare experiment, designed by the German Aerospace Center (DLR). The experiment will use two identical female body model representatives to investigate the radiation exposure during the whole flight of Artemis 1 mission, which may last for six weeks. Artemis 1 will lay the foundation for Artemis 2, in which the Orion capsule will carry real humans to the moon and return (without landing), possibly as early as 2024.
According to the German Space Center, the mannequins are made of materials that mimic the bones, soft tissues and organs of adult women, all of which will be tracked by more than 10000 passive sensors and 34 active radiation detectors. One of the mannequins, Helga, will fly to the moon without protection, while the other Zohar will wear a radiation protection vest called astrorad.
When they travel to the moon in Orion spacecraft, Helga and Zohar will be affected by the harsh space environment. After surpassing the protective shielding of the earth's magnetosphere, these mannequins will be exposed to various types of space radiation, such as charged particles produced by the sun or energy particles trapped in the earth's atmosphere. It is well known that space radiation will change the molecules of DNA, which is obviously harmful to human health. After they return to earth, the data collected from the two mannequins will help researchers better understand the level of protection provided by the newly developed astrorad vest.
The mannequins have arrived at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where they will be tied to the Orion spacecraft four weeks before the scheduled launch. NASA continues to prepare its space launch system (SLS) for the mission, which is expected to take place later this summer.