unilad homepage
  • News
    • UK News
    • US News
    • World News
    • Crime
    • Health
    • Money
    • Sport
    • Travel
  • Film and TV
    • Netflix
  • Music
  • Tech
  • Features
  • Celebrity
  • Politics
  • Advertise
  • Terms
  • Privacy & Cookies
  • LADbible Group
  • LADbible
  • SPORTbible
  • GAMINGbible
  • Tyla
  • UNILAD Tech
  • FOODbible
  • License Our Content
  • About Us & Contact
  • Jobs
  • Latest
  • Archive
  • Topics A-Z
  • Authors
Facebook
Instagram
X
Threads
TikTok
YouTube
Submit Your Content
Incredible reason why astronauts age slower while they’re in space

Home> Technology> Space

Published 14:57 29 Jun 2024 GMT+1

Incredible reason why astronauts age slower while they’re in space

The science behind the way time works is fascinating

Callum Jones

Callum Jones

google discoverFollow us on Google Discover
Featured Image Credit: NASA/Space Frontiers/Getty Images / Space Frontiers/Archive Photos/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Topics: Space, Science

Callum Jones
Callum Jones

Advert

Advert

Advert

Scientists have unpacked the head-scratching idea that time passes more slowly for astronauts than it does for the rest of us down on Earth.

Forget biohacking, jetting off into space is actually a more sure-fire way of slowing down the clock on ageing.

It sounds like something out of the film Interstellar, but the truth is the theory is very much backed up by science.

In our everyday experience on Earth, time always ticks at the same rate as we move into the future, but time is actually relative - and is experienced differently at different points in the universe, and specifically by what speed you're travelling.

Advert

Astronauts are ageing slower. (Getty Stock Photo)
Astronauts are ageing slower. (Getty Stock Photo)

The closer to the speed of light you travel relative to someone else who is travelling at a slower pace, the slower time will pass for you.

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS), for example, orbit around the Earth at 27,500 kilometres per hour.

Because they are moving faster and are closer to the speed of light than the rest of us down on Earth, time is passing more slowly for them.

As a result, astronauts age more slowly.

The BBC's Sky at Night magazine explained it like this: imagine you have a budget split between the speed you're travelling through space and time.

The faster you travel through space, the less of your budget there is to use on moving through time.

So if you're travelling faster, you experience time more slowly.

Now, when we say astronauts age more slowly than Earth dwellers, we're not talking about the kind of difference where Matthew McConaughey comes back to visit his daughter who's now decades older than him at the end of Interstellar - at least not for astronauts working on the ISS.

The theory sounds like something out of a science fiction film. (Getty Stock Photo)
The theory sounds like something out of a science fiction film. (Getty Stock Photo)

For instance, twins Mark and Scott Kelly both happened to be NASA astronauts, but Scott spent about ten times longer in space.

He was sent off to the ISS for a year to see what impact it would have on his body in comparison to his twin.

Before they both jetted off to space, Mark was six minutes older than Scott.

After his time on the ISS, Scott was six minutes and five milliseconds older.

So it's really not that much.

The more important finding of the study was that the long period in space had no significant long-term effects on Scott's body, which is a positive sign if we're looking to send humans to Mars anytime soon.

Choose your content:

11 hours ago
12 hours ago
a day ago
  • John Nacion/Variety via Getty Images
    11 hours ago

    Bill Nye issues stern warning to Trump over concerns he could 'end NASA'

    Bill Nye the Science Guy revealed that Donald Trump's NASA proposal is a 'huge mistake'

    Technology
  • (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
    11 hours ago

    NASA's 2028 moon landing already facing delay following Artemis II mission

    It's significantly pushing back the first landing on the moon since 1972

    Technology
  • Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images
    12 hours ago

    Apple CEO Tim Cook made a huge promise about iPhones 10 years before stepping down

    Apple introduced a life-changing feature just one year after Cook's promise

    Technology
  • Gabby Jones/Bloomberg via Getty Images
    a day ago

    ChatGPT down for thousands as users report issues

    ChatGPT is just one of a number of AI platforms that has had issues reported

    Technology
  • Soviet Cosmonaut had chilling last words in final transmission as he fell from space
  • How astronauts use the bathroom in space as Artemis II crew faced toilet issue
  • NASA astronaut reveals whether sex in space is actually possible
  • Bizarre reason scientist who believes mysterious space object is ‘not natural’ has invited Kim Kardashian to help research