AN IN SILICO-IN VIVO FRAMEWORK FOR THE ACUTE OCULAR AND CARDIOVASCULAR RESPONSE TO 6° HEAD-DOWN TILT

Ensuring the healthiness of astronauts undergoing long-term missions in space is of primary importance for the aerospace community. Spaceflight associated neuro-ocular syndrome (SANS) has been widely acknowledged to cause severe ocular disorders in astronauts returning from long permanence in weightlessness [1]. In this context, head-down tilt (HDT) has gained large popularity to resemble the cardiovascular response to microgravity, as well as to study SANS [2]. We propose a novel multiscale numerical framework to simulate the acute response to 6° HDBR – with in vivo validation – to help shed light on SANS onset.