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Podcasts Take Two
NASA to study astronaut Scott Kelly's body after nearly a year in space
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Mar 1, 2016
Listen • 10:44
NASA to study astronaut Scott Kelly's body after nearly a year in space
Disorientation, blood pressure issues and decrease bone mass all await astronaut Scott Kelly when he returns from nearly a year in space.
US astronaut Scott Kelly gestures as his space suit is tested at the Russian-leased Baikonur cosmodrome, prior to blasting off to the International Space Station (ISS), late on March 27, 2015. The international crew of US astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko is scheduled to blast off to the ISS from Baikonur early on March 28. AFP PHOTO / KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV (Photo credit should read KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV/AFP/Getty Images)
US astronaut Scott Kelly gestures as his space suit is tested at the Russian-leased Baikonur cosmodrome, prior to blasting off to the International Space Station (ISS), late on March 27, 2015.
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KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV/AFP/Getty Images
)

Disorientation, blood pressure issues and decrease bone mass all await astronaut Scott Kelly when he returns from nearly a year in space.

On Tuesday, astronaut Scott Kelly is set to depart from the International Space Station, his home for the past 340 days, and is expected to land in the desert of Kazakhstan early Wednesday.

It's the longest amount of time an American has ever spent in a single space trip and while he was up there, Kelly conducted a variety of experiments during his almost-year in orbit. But perhaps the most important experiment of all was what happened to his own body while he was up there. They'll put him through a battery of tests, but they'll also compare his results to those of his twin brother's, astronaut Mark Kelly. While Scott has been in space for nearly a year, Mark has been back on earth. 

What they find out might help shape missions to other places... like Mars.

Jennifer Fogarty is the Deputy Chief Scientist of the Human Research Program at NASA and she joins A Martinez to talk about the sort of impact that space can have on an astronauts body and mind.