ANKARA
Begum Aydogan Mathyk, an obstetrics and gynecology researcher on the College of South Florida, will examine the well being of an all-women flight crew scheduled for 2026.
British-American area tourism agency Virgin Galactic is planning the spaceflight in partnership with the Worldwide Institute for Astronautical Sciences IIAS-02 analysis mission.
Mathyk informed Anadolu that her curiosity in ladies’s well being, mixed together with her intrigue for scientific discoveries, led her to this subject. Starting her profession in Türkiye, she then moved to the US to additional her research and pursue revolutionary initiatives.
The Turkish physician shared that she participated in NASA’s Internship within the Division of House Drugs Operations on the company’s Johnson House Middle, gaining expertise and coaching in Houston, Texas. She additionally participated in NASA’s Spaceflight Know-how, Functions, and Analysis program.
Mathyk emphasised the importance of area drugs for humanity’s future, significantly given the shortcomings within the subject, and expressed pleasure about discovering new options for girls’s well being.
Underlining the shortage of research on ladies’s well being in area, she identified that whereas animal replica research have been carried out in area, her method is completely different.
“I’m now the one obstetrician within the US to actively lead analysis on this subject, as I’m not solely contributing scientifically but additionally main research in numerous teams,” she added.
She stated her analysis on medical imaging in area, particularly gynecological ultrasound, is the primary of its form. Testing ultrasound’s applicability in zero gravity has supplied vital knowledge for the well being checks of ladies astronauts shifting ahead.
“I’ve been working to grasp the results of area on ladies’s well being and develop options. Our work was printed within the Nature scientific journal,” she stated, including: “Scientists from over 25 nations analyzed and printed the results of spaceflight on human biology from genetic, epigenetic, and molecular views. Nevertheless, our work on estrogen is probably the most complete publication on this matter.”
“We make clear our understanding of the results of area journey on ladies’s well being. I’ve additionally given many shows at NASA conferences and different area companies, collaborating with many consultants in area biology and drugs,” she added.
Mathyk highlighted the significance of shifting ladies’s well being research from Earth to area, because the long-term results of area on ladies astronauts’ reproductive well being and hormonal programs stay unknown.
“We’d like extra info for girls’s well being in long-term area journeys, reminiscent of (potential) Martian and lunar missions, and gynecological examinations ought to be capable to be carried out independently from Earth,” she stated. “Have been an area colony to be established, guaranteeing ladies’s well being will likely be one of the vital important points.”
Mathyk known as area exploration a multidisciplinary subject and urged Turkish scientists from engineering, biology, drugs, physics, chemistry, and different disciplines to contribute to it.
“Türkiye has an important heritage in aviation, with Sabiha Gokcen because the world’s first lady fighter pilot, proving together with her braveness and management that ladies can thrive in aviation,” she famous. “As a girl scientist myself, I’m very proud to proceed this legacy in area drugs. Now, I’m trying ahead to finding out ladies astronauts’ well being on an all-women spaceflight with Virgin Galactic in 2026.”
“My recommendation to budding scientists and college students is that they need to not lose their pleasure for studying and studying and persevering with to enhance themselves,” she added. “Türkiye’s steps in area drugs, biotechnology, and area analysis have paved the way in which for the nation to strengthen its place in science and know-how—and this work is just the start of Türkiye’s permanence on this subject.”
