In this episode of Space 3D, the co-hosts speak with John Charles of NASA’s Johnson Space Center about the medical capabilities of the space program. Topics covered include women in space, cosmic hygiene, the importance of posture, astronaut exercise equipment, physiologic adaptations of age and more!

This is part 3 of our interview with Dr. John Charles.

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John Charles, PhD was a child of the early space age, and clearly remembers playing “John Glenn” while lying on his back in the dusty playground of his elementary school, in the launch posture with his legs up and over some handrails. A scientific interest in weightlessness led him to a career in the space life sciences, and a lifelong fascination with spaceflight in general has kept him in the library stacks and on-line archives researching little known aspects of spaceflight history. Charles earned his bachelor of science in biophysics at The Ohio State University and his doctorate in physiology and biophysics at the University of Kentucky. He has been at the Johnson Space Center since 1983, where he investigated the cardiovascular effects of space flight on Space Shuttle astronauts and on crewmembers of the Russian space station Mir. He was mission scientist for the NASA research on American astronauts on Mir, on John Glenn’s Space Shuttle flight, and on STS-107, Columbia’s last mission in January 2003. In between two stints as Chief Scientist of NASA’s Human Research Program, he was Chief of HRP’s International Science Office and led the planning for the joint US-Russian year-long ISS mission and its Twins Study. He is a fellow of the Aerospace Medical Association and a full member of the International Academy of Astronautics, has published over 60 scientific articles, and has received several professional awards.

John retired from NASA in February 2018, but will continue advocating for human space exploration while doing research in the history of space life sciences.