Our grandchildren will live in space

It’s already working so, “further in the future than near”When the world reaches its population limit, life will spread into space despite being “the project of decades” and the current generation will not “see results”. alvaro soriaOperations Engineer for the International Space Station (ISS) European Space Agency (ESA).

“50 percent of ESA’s research on the ISS devoted himself to the study of human physiology. What happens in zero gravity is that the body ages extremely quickly, and there are many effects that help us understand diseases like osteoporosis or Alzheimer’s,” Soria explained in an interview with EFE.

He adds that “being able to solve these challenges is the main limiting factor in being able to move to another planet in the future,” but on Earth “resources are limited“and, as one engineer put it, we will have to head to infinity, go to infinity and look for another place where we can live”.

INVESTMENT IN SPACE IS PROFITABLE

Soria, who joined Malaga this Wednesday, FuturOn technoscience conferences, Organized by the La Térmica cultural centre, it advocates investment in the aviation sector, which “protects and develops the country’s industry to make it competitive, generate jobs and value, and improve the economy”.

“Often the main argument justifying any investment in technology and research is that it is what will keep us going when tough times come, and the pandemic is a great example of this argument“Investing in the aerospace sector is “investing directly in real-life technologies, medical research, or new materials”.

Final selection as Leon’s backup astronaut Sarah Garcia, According to Soria, who coordinates the Columbus lab on the ISS that specializes in biotechnology and medicine, the cancer researcher shows that ESA is “interested in profiles from different fields of science and technology.”

about space tourism He believes this is “very positive, because it is another facet of the commercialization of access to space and brings it closer to the everyday life of citizens,” and he predicts that “this century we will see private space stations with private vehicles.” “.

But ESASince it does not have a vehicle or launch vehicle, it cannot compete in that sector.r” is an issue that was discussed at the ministerial meeting last week, because “Europe in that sense is quite late,” Soria warns.

HOW TO WORK IN A SPACE AGENCY

The engineer from Malaga believes it’s “more psychological” for a Spaniard to find it difficult to work for the ESA, because “Spain has been participating since the 80s and the fourth or fifth country to contribute, but for some reason it still seems distant to our society”.

“How to get there? Obviously, to work hard, but above all to have motivation and enthusiasm, because in the end all roads lead to Rome, there is no single road. Profile to work at ESA And you need people from all walks of life, not just science and engineering.”

Their work is laboratory-based. columbus “and making sure that everything in their instruments and experiments is working, from logistics to energy to temperature or time for the astronauts to do the science done in space.”

Soria was “surprised” the number of people suitable for the astronaut position, and currently the requirements are “Nothing to do with what is requested in Apollo missions, no need for superhumans.”

“You just need people who have it. career path in an interesting fieldOne who has good enough emotional intelligence to perform well in an operational environment and work well as a team in an environment that can become stressful due to circumstances because you can’t go home when you want to.

THE EFFECT OF WAR IN SPACE

The invasion of Ukraine affected space and showed that: “although international cooperation is fundamental and positive”a country cannot relinquish its autonomy to this cooperation, “because you eventually become dependent on any situation like war and you can’t do that to your society.”

For Europe, which “lost the possibility of sending a mission”, the effect of the war was “clear and clear”. exomars It went to Mars, where it would go with NASA, and then retreated, so ESA looked for another partner, which is Russia.”

On the other hand, with various cities competing to house the headquarters of the future Spanish Space Agency, this engineer doesn’t believe “it’s very relevant”. Germany and the space agency has several headquarters scattered across the country. I don’t know why there is so much discussion, because eventually the center will be an interface with all of Spain and the rest of Europe. The discussion seems irrelevant to me, and the question has to be what role and what budget the Agency will have.”