Last year NASA astronaut Frank Rubio set a new US record by becoming the first American to spend more than a year of his life in space.
Rubio returned to Earth on 27 September, 2023 after racking up a grand total of 371 days in space.
Spending so long unshackled from the mortal confines of our planet resulted in a number of changes to his body, as time in space changes a person in more ways than one.
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When the 48-year-old landed in Kazakhstan, he said that he was to be assessed by a medical team and he’d need a fair bit of time to re-adjust to Earth’s gravity, which sounds pretty reasonable.
Rubio was actually supposed to be on his mission for six months, but the time he spent in space got doubled and it made him a prime example of what the effects of living gravity-free for such a long time looks like.
We Earthbound people with no access to spaceships might not even be able to comprehend what this could be like.
The lack of gravity causes a decrease in muscle mass and even bone loss within just the first couple months of a mission – let alone the year Rubio spent up there.
At the time of the NASA astronaut's landing, Dr Jennifer Fogarty, chief scientific officer at Baylor College of Medicine's Translational Research Institute for Space Health, told ABC News: "How do you coordinate movement like walking, which you haven't done for a long period of time, and then the idea of balance?
"When you put those two together, it can kind of create a little bit of a precarious situation and something that's very well-monitored with the crew members when they land on Earth."
The expert also added that the longer the time in space goes on for, the longer the time it takes for the astronaut to reacclimatise when they get back.
Plus when living in space, an astronaut’s blood flow can be heavily affected.
This can cause symptoms including blurred vision or eye swelling due to something known as Spaceflight Associated Neuro-Ocular Syndrome.
According to the co-director of the Center for Aerospace Physiology at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Dr Michael Decker, our veins have handy-dandy valves in them to make sure ‘blood doesn’t flow backwards when we stand up’.
And being enclosed in a weightless room for a long period of time will certainly impact the body's blood flow.
He added: "Some of this increased intracranial pressure can actually impact the eye and lead to visual impairment.
"Sometimes when astronauts land, that visual impairment does not necessarily resolve."
Rubio’s mental and physical health will have been assessed while he was in space and in January, he explained that he’d spent the past four months ‘reincorporating [himself] back into Earth’.
“You adapt incredibly quickly to being in space, but then unfortunately, the readaptation process back to earth can sometimes be a little bit longer and more difficult." he told TIME.
"And that's just, I think, because the forces of gravity and the forces at play here on Earth tend to have a stronger effect on your body. So it takes two to three months to get yourself back to where you were pre-flight. I'm feeling pretty normal."
He added: “At this point, I feel like I'm back to 90-95%. So lots of exercise, lots of testing, and science."
While Rubio holds the American record, if you're wondering who the all time record holder for being in space is, that goes to Valeri Polyakov who between 1994 and 1995 spent a whopping 437 continuous days in orbit.
Jess Battison