SpaceX founder Elon Musk has made it clear that he wants to go to Mars. And Chicago-based medical video game studio Level Ex wants to help him get there and back in one piece.
In less than a month, the tech startup — or at least its technology — is slated to join four astronauts on SpaceX's Polaris Dawn mission, where the company hopes to demonstrate that an untrained astronaut with no medical background can do ultrasounds in space.
After several delays, the mission is set to launch from Florida in July. The first of three spaceflights for the Polaris Program, Polaris Dawn will conduct extensive scientific research using new technologies.
Thirty-eight projects were selected for astronauts to conduct on the five-day orbit and among them is "ultrasound innovation" using Level Ex technology in collaboration with engineering and technology company KBR Inc.
"During space exploration missions, crew must be prepared to diagnose and treat themselves as medical issues arise," describes the Polaris Dawn mission plan. "In this study, the Polaris Dawn crew will use a miniatruized, intelligent ultrasound to scan themselves and collect medical-grade images."
Other projects include looking at motion sickness susceptibility and testing the viability of in-flight, X-ray radiographs in space. The crew will also attempt the first-ever commercial spacewalk.
Level Ex founder and CEO Sam Glassenberg said the Chicago startup has been working with NASA and the Mars mission for a number of years.
"I'll give you a scenario: You're nine months into the mission. All of a sudden, one of the astronauts grabs their chest in microgravity, rolls over unconscious. You're thousands of miles from the closest MRI or X-ray, so what do you do?" he told Chicago Inno.
While there are ultrasound probes on the International Space Station and a radiologist on the ground in Houston, whom Level Ex has worked with in the past, getting ultrasounds in real time, especially when you consider long-term deep space missions, is a challenge, Glassenberg said.
"The Mars mission is going to take years, so there's no time to get everybody a medical degree in space," he said.
That's why he thinks that Level Ex's just-in-time training that provides astronauts with the ability to do independent medical procedures could be a game changer for deep space exploration. The Chicago startup is building what it calls the most realistic real-time ultrasound simulator in the solar system.
Level Ex's handheld ultrasound probe will be used by the crew to measure blood flow changes in the jugular vein.
"We're testing how effectively can we train you to use an ultrasound probe and conduct an ultrasound procedure, but training you by yourself in microgravity," he said. "What we learn from this is going to help us on the Mars mission."
