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PARIS — A decade ago, Elon Musk proposed a new form of transport that would shoot passengers through vacuum tunnels in levitating pods at almost the speed of sound — he called it “hyperloop”. 

Since then, cities from Abu Dhabi to Zurich have been touted as destinations, research projects have gobbled up millions of dollars and a host of commercial ventures have sprung up — even Richard Branson got involved.

“The transportation network has not had a new mode for over 100 years,” said Rick Geddes, a transport infrastructure expert at Cornell University in the United States, who compared the excitement to the early days of aviation.

But nobody has come close to making the hyperloop work.

The difficulties have ranged from costs and finding suitable locations, to simply persuading people that travelling through a narrow tunnel at speeds faster than a jet plane is a good idea.

Musk’s initial proposal would have been a “barf ride”, transport blogger Alon Levy wrote at the time.

Despite all the problems, though, the hyperloop idea still energises university campuses, corporate board rooms and city halls across the world.

Hidde de Bos, a 22-year-old engineering student, first heard of it four years ago.

His university at Delft in The Netherlands excelled in competitions run by Musk’s SpaceX firm, which invited students to develop pods to fire through vacuum tunnels.

Musk returns

“It made me really excited to see what the possibilities were,” he told AFP.

He is now chief engineer of Delft Hyperloop, a non-profit university spin-off.

De Bos said the SpaceX competitions, which were discontinued in 2019, were too focused on speed and became like “drag races in a tunnel”.

Now, his team is taking part in a student-led competition, European Hyperloop Week, which he hopes will refocus on sustainable energy and developing levitation systems.

And Musk himself recently gave a jolt to the hyperloop fraternity by tweeting that his tunnelling firm The Boring Company would “attempt to build a working Hyperloop” in the coming years.

Musk first mentioned the idea in a 2012 media interview before publishing a white paper about it a year later.

But his direct involvement has been sporadic, and he has always encouraged others to develop the idea.

Los Angeles-based firm Hyperloop TT, among the first and most enthusiastic firms to run with Musk’s idea, welcomed his return.

Rob Miller, the firm’s chief marketing officer, told AFP it was “further validation” for the concept.

‘More cautious’

But he stressed that hyperloop was now much bigger than just one man.

Bearing out his point, new proposals have emerged in recent months from local authorities ranging from Italy to India.

However, proposals are one thing, and revolutionising public transport is quite another.

In its early years, Hyperloop TT signed exploratory deals in India, China and beyond.

In 2019, the firm promised a 10-kilometre track would open in the UAE the following year.

None of these projects has come to fruition.

“We’re a little more cautious now about those types of announcements,” said Miller. 

Virgin Hyperloop, a firm briefly helmed by Richard Branson but majority-owned by DP World, which runs Dubai’s ports, has also had to scale back its promises.

Prestige versus price

It was the first company to fire humans along a hyperloop test track back in 2020. 

Branson had mooted a 45-minute journey between London and Scotland.

But Virgin Hyperloop recently abandoned the idea of carrying passengers altogether, shed half its staff and is now focused on a potential freight line in UAE.

Musk has also promised various hyperloop projects that failed to materialise.

Virgin Hyperloop and The Boring Company did not respond to AFP requests for comment. 

Critic Alon Levy says the hyperloop is caught between unrealistic prestige projects across short distances and longer routes that cost too much.

The Abu Dhabi-Dubai route promised by Hyperloop TT is just 130 kilometres, “not even a distance for high-speed rail”, he said.

But potential routes like New York to Miami or Chicago would need around $50 billion just to get started, Levy reckons.

‘Bring it to life’

“You don’t get that from private investors,” he told AFP.

Levy does see one ray of light — newer designs featuring longer bends seem to have resolved the “barf” problem.

And enthusiasts still radiate positivity.

“We’ll keep doing what we’re doing and we’ll bring it to life,” said Miller.

But he conceded his firm had been “overly optimistic about timelines”.

He now predicts the first city-to-city track within five years but won’t divulge the location.

Geddes is also optimistic about the future, though he also reflected that past promises weighed heavy.

“We used to say five to 10 years,” he said. “That was five years ago. Maybe it’s five to 10 years now.”

LOS ANGELES — HBO’s “Succession” topped this year’s Emmy nominations, earning 25 nods on Tuesday, as “Squid Game” became the first non-English-language drama series shortlisted for glory for television’s equivalent of the Oscars.

“Succession”, which follows a rich, powerful family vying to inherit a media empire, led the drama nominees, while “Ted Lasso” and “The White Lotus” topped the comedy and limited series categories with 20 nominations each.

Two other comedies — HBO’s “Hacks” and Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building” — each racked up 17 nominations for the 74th Emmy Awards, to be handed out at a glitzy ceremony in Los Angeles on September 12.

“With production at a historic high, the Academy has received a record number of Emmy submissions this season,” said Television Academy CEO Frank Scherma, praising “this platinum age of television”.

Television productions have ramped back up, after being shuttered or scaled back in the first year of the coronavirus pandemic. 

“Succession” will compete for best drama with “Squid Game”, a violent South Korean satire in which society’s marginalised compete for cash in fatal versions of children’s games — and Netflix’s most-watched series ever.

“Squid Game” also picked up multiple acting nominations, including best lead actor for Lee Jung-jae, to earn 14 nods in total.

The groundbreaking show is hoping to follow in the footsteps of South Korean film “Parasite,” which rocked Hollywood in 2020 by becoming the first non-English-language film to win best picture at the Oscars.

Others in the running for the best drama Emmy include “Euphoria”, “Ozark”, “Better Call Saul” and “Stranger Things”.

“Succession” stars Brian Cox and Jeremy Strong will compete with Lee for best actor in a drama series, while former Oscar winner Adrien Brody earned a guest actor nomination.

“I am a huge fan of ‘Succession’ and am beyond thrilled to have been included in such an extraordinary show,” said Brody of the series, which already won best drama in 2020 with its second season.

“Euphoria” star and past winner Zendaya, 25, became the youngest acting nominee to be shortlisted twice, for best actress in a drama — a category in which “The Morning Show” actress Jennifer Aniston missed out to co-star Reese Witherspoon.

‘Emmy nominated, baby!’

HBO — and its streaming platform HBO Max — won the network nominations battle, earning a combined 140 compared to Netflix’s 105.

In the comedy categories, past winners Jason Sudeikis (“Ted Lasso”), Bill Hader (“Barry”) and Donald Glover (“Atlanta”) will battle it out for best actor, as will Jean Smart (“Hacks”) and Rachel Brosnahan (“The Marvelous Mrs Maisel”) for best actress.

Selena Gomez missed out on an acting nomination for “Only Murders in the Building” — even though her male co-stars Steve Martin and Martin Short earned nods.

But she still made history as the second ever Latina nominated as a producer in the category.

“Abbott Elementary”, ABC’s school-based mockumentary, earned seven nods including acting, writing and comedy series nominations for creator Quinta Brunson.

“Crying shaking and throwing up has new meaning to me because I real life did all three,” Brunson tweeted.

“Still speechless... Emmy nominated, baby!

A-list flocks to limited series

In the limited series categories, “The White Lotus” — a satirical look at hypocrisy and wealth among the visitors to a luxury Hawaii hotel — scored eight acting nominations for an ensemble cast including Jennifer Coolidge and Murray Bartlett.

Elsewhere, A-listers including Colin Firth (“The Staircase”), Andrew Garfield (“Under the Banner of Heaven”), Oscar Isaac (“Scenes From a Marriage”) and Michael Keaton (“Dopesick”) will vie for best actor in a limited series.

But there were notable big-name omissions on the short list for best actress in a limited series, including Julia Roberts (“Gaslit”) and Jessica Chastain (“Scenes from a Marriage”).

Instead, the category will feature Amanda Seyfried (“The Dropout”), Julia Garner (“Inventing Anna”) and Sarah Paulson (“Impeachment: American Crime Story”) among others. 

NEW YORK — Leonard Cohen’s song “Hallelujah” pretty much flopped when it came out nearly 40 years ago.

Today, it enjoys cult status and has been performed by everyone from Bob Dylan to Jeff Buckley and Bon Jovi — even appearing in animated hit “Shrek” — in a unique evolution detailed in a new documentary film.

The tune rich in religious and erotic references by the Canadian poet, who died in 2016, has made the rounds.

In 2008, a gospel version of the song was performed by Alexandra Burke on the British TV talent show “The X Factor”. 

That year the song placed 1st, 2nd and 36th in the British music charts: The versions by Burke, Buckley and the original by Cohen himself. 

“I do not know of any other song with that trajectory,” said music journalist Alan Light, who wrote a book on the song called “The Holy or the Broken”, published in 2012.

‘Snowball is rolling’

“This song took 10 years, 20 years, going through all these different versions, around these different corners and then it gains this momentum. The snowball is rolling, and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger,” Light told AFP.

He spoke in New York at a showing of the new documentary “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song”, for which was an adviser and producer.

The film shows that, at first, the work was destined for obscurity.

A practicing Jew who eventually retired to a Buddhist monastery, poet-turned-singer Cohen took years to write the spiritual and image-rich lines of the song, which evokes King David, his music and his temptations. 

Cohen left out dozens of the verses he had written.

The Columbia record label refused to release “Various Positions”, the LP that included “Hallelujah,” in the United States. It did come out in Europe, among other the places.

Competition was stiff that year, and slow, poetic songs were not crowding the top of the charts.

“It’s 1984. It’s boom time in the music business. This is the year of ‘Born in the USA’, and ‘Like a Virgin’ and ‘Purple Rain,’” Light said, referring to huge hits by Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, and Prince.

A few years later, Dylan lifted the song out of the darkness with a blues version.

Then John Cale, one of the founders of The Velvet Underground, covered it in 1991, followed by Buckley’s in 1994.

Bono apologises

The documentary shows how “Hallelujah” became a feature of popular culture, with new generations discovering it in the first “Shrek” movie in 2001 and in “Sing” in 2016.

In 2010, the Canadian singer K.D. Lang belted it out at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. And 11 years later “Hallelujah” was performed again at a tribute to victims of the coronavirus pandemic, with President Joe Biden in attendance on the eve of his swearing in.

Light says the song has a beautiful melody and but also lyrics open to interpretation. 

“If to you it’s a religious song, that’s there. If to you, it’s a heartbreak song, great, that’s there. You can do that,” Light said.

“There’s no wrong way to do it,” he added, noting a ukelele version by US musician Jake Shimabukuro.

Not all agree, however. 

In an interview for his book on “Hallelujah”, Light recalled how U2 frontman Bono apologised for a 1995 trip-hop version of the song he recorded, in which he talked his way through the lyrics, rather than sang.

TOKYO — From laser beams and wooden satellites to galactic tow-truck services, start-ups in Japan are trying to imagine ways to deal with a growing environmental problem: Space debris. 

Junk like used satellites, parts of rockets and wreckage from collisions has been piling up since the space age began, with the problem accelerating in recent decades.

“We’re entering an era when many satellites will be launched one after another. Space will become more and more crowded,” said Miki Ito, general manager at Astroscale, a company dedicated to “space sustainability”.

“There are simulations suggesting space won’t be usable if we go on like this,” she told AFP. “So we must improve the celestial environment before it’s too late.”

The European Space Agency (ESA) estimates that around one million pieces of debris larger than a centimeter—big enough to “disable a spacecraft”—are in Earth’s orbit.

They are already causing problems, from a near-miss in January involving a Chinese satellite, to a five-millimetre hole knocked into a robotic arm on the International Space Station last year.

“It’s hard to predict exactly how fast the amount of space debris will increase,” said Toru Yamamoto, a senior researcher at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

But “it’s an issue that raises real concerns about the sustainable use of space”.

With satellites now crucial for GPS, broadband and banking data, collisions pose significant risks on Earth.

Tadanori Fukushima has seen the scale of the problem in his job as an engineer with Tokyo-based satellite operator and broadcaster SKY Perfect JSAT.

“A stationary satellite would get roughly 100 ‘debris-approaching’ alerts a year,” he told AFP.

International “satellite disposal guidelines” include rules like moving used satellites to “graveyard orbit”— but the increase in debris means more is needed, specialists say.

‘No panacea’

Fukushima launched an in-house start-up in 2018 and envisions using a laser beam to vaporise the surface of space debris, creating a pulse of energy that pushes the object into a new orbit.

The irradiating laser means there’s no need to touch any debris, which is generally said to move about 7.5 kilometres per second — much faster than a bullet.

For now, the project is experimental, but Fukushima hopes to test the idea in space by spring 2025, working with several research institutions.

Japanese firms, along with some in Europe and the United States, are leading the way on developing solutions, according to Fukushima.

Some projects are further along, including Astroscale’s space “tow-truck”, which uses a magnet to collect out-of-service satellites.

“If a car breaks down, you call a tow-truck service. If a satellite breaks down and stays there, it faces the risk of collision with debris and needs to be collected quickly,” Ito explained.

The firm carried out a successful trial last year and imagines one day equipping customer satellites with a “docking plate” equivalent to a tow-truck’s hook, allowing collection later on.

Astroscale, which has a contract with the ESA, plans a second test by the end of 2024 and hopes to launch its service soon after.

Other efforts approach the problem at the source, by creating satellites that don’t produce debris.

Kyoto University and Sumitomo Forestry envisage a wooden satellite that goes into orbit in a rocket and burns up safely when it plunges to Earth.

That project is also in its infancy — in March, pieces of wood were sent to the International Space Station to test how they respond to cosmic rays.

Space agencies have their own programs, with JAXA focusing on large debris over three tons.

And internationally, firms including US-based Orbit Fab and Australia’s Neumann Space have proposed ideas such as in-orbit refueling to extend the life of satellites.

The problem is complex enough that a range of solutions will be needed, said JAXA’s Yamamoto.

“There is no panacea.” 

PARIS — Cloaked in darkness and mystery, the creatures of the deep oceans exist in a world of unlikely profusion, surviving on scant food and under pressure that would crush human lungs.

This extremely hostile environment, which will come under the spotlight at a major United Nations oceans summit in Lisbon this week, has caused its inhabitants to develop a prodigious array of alien characteristics and idiosyncratic survival techniques.

A vast assortment of animals populate the sunless depths, from the colossal squid, which wrapped its tentacles around the imaginations of sailors and storytellers, to beings with huge cloudy eyes, or whose bodies are as transparent as glass. 

And the angler fish, with its devilish looks illuminated by a built-in headlamp, showing that the deep dark is alive with lights.

‘Incredible’ creatures

Until the middle of the 19th century, scientists believed that life was impossible beyond a few hundred metres.

“They imagined that there was nothing, because of the absence of light, the pressure, the cold, and the lack of food,” Nadine Le Bris, a professor at Sorbonne University, told AFP. 

Between 200 and 1,000 metres, the light fades until it vanishes completely, and with it plants; at 2,000 metres the pressure is 200 times that of the atmosphere. 

From the abyssal plains to the cavernous trenches plunging deeper than Everest is high, aquatic existence continues in spectacular diversity. 

“When people think of the deep sea they often think of the seafloor,” said Karen Osborn of the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum. 

“But all that water in between is full of incredible animals. There is a tonne of life.”

These open water inhabitants face a formidable challenge: They have nowhere to hide. 

“There’s no seaweed to hide in, no caves or mud to dig into,” said Osborn. 

“There are predators coming at them from below, from above, from all around.” 

Masters of disguise

One tactic is to become invisible. 

Some creatures are red, making them difficult to distinguish in an environment where red light no longer filters through. 

Others render themselves transparent. 

Take the transparent gossamer worm, which ranges in size from a few millimetres to around a metre long and shimmies through the water by fluttering its frilly limbs. 

“They look like a fern frond,” said Osborn.

“They’re beautiful animals and they shoot yellow bioluminescent light out of the tips of their arms. What could be better than that.”

Bioluminescence is particularly common among fish, squid, and types of jellyfish, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which says around 80 per cent of animals living between 200 and 1,000 metres produce their own light. 

This chemical process might be helpful for defence, reproduction or to find food — but no one knows for sure why so many creatures have evolved it, says NOAA. 

‘Sea snow’

With no plants around and animals scattered in the vastness doing their utmost to disappear, creatures in the ocean depths often have a hard time finding a live meal. 

“If you happen to get lucky and hit a patch of your food, bingo! But you may not see another one for three weeks,” said Osborn. 

Another option is to feast on the dead. 

Organic particles from the surface waters — disintegrated bodies of animals and plants, mingling with faecal matter — drift down in what is known as “marine snow”. 

This cadaverous confetti forms part of a process that sequesters carbon dioxide in the ocean depths.

It is also a lifeline for many deep sea animals, including the blood red vampire squid which, contrary to its reputation, peacefully hoovers up marine snow.

When giants like dead whales sink to the seabed, they are swiftly reduced to bone by scavengers. 

Final frontier

With most of the oceans still unexplored, it is often said that we know more about the surface of Mars than we do about the seafloor on our own planet. 

But unlike outer space, scientists keep finding life even under the most hostile of conditions. 

Like the searing hydrothermal vents at the cracks between oceanic plates that spew chemical compounds such as hydrogen sulphide. 

Microorganisms use this to create organic matter via “chemosynthesis”, like plants use the sun for photosynthesis, which in turn feeds “exuberant” ecosystems, said Pierre-Marie Sarradin, head of the Deep Ecosystems department at the French research agency Ifremer. 

These hydrothermal springs were totally unknown until the 1970s. 

Scientists have so far identified some 250,000 marine species, though there could still be at least a million to be discovered.

Could there be an elusive sea monster lurking in the depths? Despite measuring more than 10 metres in length the colossal squid has only very rarely been seen.

“I don’t think we’re going to find a megalodon,” said Osborn, referring to the giant ancestor of the shark.

Humans may not have explored much of the deep seas, but they have left their mark, via global heating, overfishing and pollution. 

Oceans are acidifying as they absorb more and more CO2, there is a growing prevalence of “dead zones” without oxygen, while microplastics have been found in crustaceans at a depth of nearly 11 kilometres in the Mariana Trench. 

Food reaches the bottom in smaller quantities. 

Nadine Le Bris said species that “already live at the limits in terms of oxygen or temperature”, are already “disturbed”.

PARIS — Startups and major carmakers are starting to incorporate solar panels on their electric vehicles, an addition that extends the range of the cars even if perpetual motion remains a dream.

As it rolls under the blistering sun of northern Spain, the Lightyear 0 generates enough electricity every day to drive 70 kilometres thanks to the five square metres of solar panels integrated into hood and roof.

The company was founded by young Dutch engineers who earned their spurs in running solar cars in races across the Australian desert.

Thanks to the drop in the price of solar panels, Lightyear is trying to incorporate them into road cars.

With its sleek, aerodynamic line and motors integrated into the wheels, the Lightyear 0 consumes less energy than electric SUVs. 

Coupled with a battery that offers 625 kilometres per charge, the company says some customers who drive only short distances each day may only need to charge during the winter.

“The clock is ticking, we need to have sustainable cars as soon as possible,” one of the founders, Lex Hoefsloot, told AFP. 

“Charging points are still a big hurdle. If we don’t need them, we can scale electric cars much quicker,” he added. 

Lightyear targeted the top-end of the market with the 0, with the 1,000 or so cars produced setting back buyers 250,000 euros, the equivalent of a Bentley.

The company hopes to launch a mass-market model with a price tag of 30,000 euros ($31,500) in 2024-2025. 

Going mainstream

As sales of electric vehicles are soaring, a number of models with solar panels are expected to arrive in dealerships in the coming months.

Toyota is now proposing solar panels as an option on Prius hybrids, as well as its first 100 per cent electric vehicle, the BZ4X.

Tesla also plans to offer solar panels as an option on its pickup that is due to hit the road next year.

Mercedes equipped its luxurious EQXX with solar panels in the roof. The sedan, sleek like the Lightyear, has a range of 1,000 kilometres.

The cost of adding solar panels to cars has now fallen to several hundred dollars, a small amount compared to the overall cost of most models.

“Solar is now so inexpensive that even imperfectly sunny locations are worth putting solar on,” said Gregory Nemet, a solar power expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“The value of putting solar on cars is that it can extend the range of the car,” he said.

While it may not be able to fully charge the battery in a day, “it can provide enough energy to get home”.

Or solar panels can help provide enough electricity to run the air conditioning in the vehicles, noted Gautham Ram Chandra Mouli, a specialist on electric mobility at Delft University in The Netherlands. 

Parking problems

Drivers will likely want to run the air conditioning as they will have to park in the sun in order to get a good charge.

That could pose problems for some city drivers with parking spaces in garages.

The season is also an important factor. Drivers in northern Europe will get much less of a charge from integrated solar panels in the winter than during the summer. 

The California startup Aptera, which has 25,000 orders, designed its futuristic three-wheeler to be highly efficient in order to get the most from solar power.

The two-seater vehicles, which should begin to be delivered to buyers this year, could get over 60 kilometres of travel from its solar panels.

Depending on the model, which cost from $26,000 to $46,000, the cars can travel from 400 to 1,600 kilometres on a full battery charge.

German firm Sono Motors has taken a more classic approach with its compact-minivan Sion.

A boxy, black five-seater that screams family car, the Sion is completely covered in solar panels.

“We developed a technique that allows covering all the car” with solar panels, said Jona Christians, a co-founder of Sono Motors.

The first Sions should be delivered next year and the current pre-order price is 28,500 euros.

The firm already has 18,000 such pre-orders and hopes to be able to manufacture over a quarter-million vehicles this decade.

The Sion is also being designed to offer different functionalities from its battery, including powering other devices and charging other vehicles. It can even give power back to the grid.

The Dutch firm Squad Mobility is targeting a different market — what it calls sub(urban) mobility.

The Squad Solar City Car may resemble an enclosed golf cart, but the two- or four-seat vehicles can zip around fast enough and have enough room to make completing many urban errands convenient. 

With the solar panels in the roof, the car can generate enough power to travel 20 kilometres per day in Europe. 

The company says such microcars travel around 12 kilometres per day on average, meaning most users won’t need to charge it daily.

“Solar panels will get more affordable, drivetrains will get better,” said Squad Mobility’s chief, Robert Hoevers.

“Sooner or later you’ll drive everyday on solar.” 

PARIS — Astronauts lose decades’ worth of bone mass in space that many do not recover even after a year back on Earth, researchers recently said, warning that it could be a “big concern” for future missions to Mars.

Previous research has shown astronauts lose between one to two per cent of bone density for every month spent in space, as the lack of gravity takes the pressure off their legs when it comes to standing and walking.

To find out how astronauts recover once their feet are back on the ground, a new study scanned the wrists and ankles of 17 astronauts before, during and after a stay on the International Space Station.

The bone density lost by astronauts was equivalent to how much they would shed in several decades if they were back on Earth, said study co-author Steven Boyd of Canada’s University of Calgary and director of the McCaig Institute for Bone and Joint Health.

The researchers found that the shinbone density of nine of the astronauts had not fully recovered after a year on Earth — and were still lacking around a decade’s worth of bone mass.

The astronauts who went on the longest missions, which ranged from four to seven months on the ISS, were the slowest to recover.

“The longer you spend in space, the more bone you lose,” Boyd told AFP.

Boyd said it is a “big concern” for planned for future missions to Mars, which could see astronauts spend years in space.

“Will it continue to get worse over time or not? We don’t know,” he said.

“It’s possible we hit a steady state after a while, or it’s possible that we continue to lose bone. But I can’t imagine that we’d continue to lose it until there’s nothing left.”

A 2020 modelling study predicted that over a three-year spaceflight to Mars, 33 per cent of astronauts would be at risk of osteoporosis.

Boyd said some answers could come from research currently being carried out on astronauts who spent at least a year onboard the ISS.

Guillemette Gauquelin-Koch, the head of medicine research at France’s CNES space agency, said that the weightlessness experienced in space is “most drastic physical inactivity there is”.

“Even with two hours of sport a day, it is like you are bedridden for the other 22 hours,” said the doctor, who was not part of the study.

“It will not be easy for the crew to set foot on Martian soil when they arrive — it’s very disabling.”

‘The silent disease’

The new study, which was published in Scientific Reports, also showed how spaceflight alters the structure of bones themselves.

Boyd said that if you thought of a body’s bones like the Eiffel Tower, it would as if some of the connecting metal rods that hold the structure up were lost.

“And when we return to Earth, we thicken up what’s remaining, but we don’t actually create new rods,” he said.

Some exercises are better for retaining bone mass than others, the study found.

Deadlifting proved significantly more effective than running or cycling, it said, suggesting more heavy lower-body exercises in the future.

But the astronauts — who are mostly fit and in their 40s — did not tend to notice the drastic bone loss, Boyd said, pointing out that the Earth-bound equivalent osteoporosis is known as “the silent disease”.

Canadian astronaut Robert Thirsk, who has spent the most time in space, said that for him bones and muscles took the longest to recover after spaceflight.

“But within a day of landing, I felt comfortable again as an Earthling,” he said in a statement accompanying the research.