High-Level Project Summary
A WEB App platform with a goal to intrigue and inspire a broader audience to explore and study the Hazards of space that must be overcome in order to move forward into the unknown. With a combination of 3D design and interactivity, we present the basic space travel stresses and the scientific as well as supernatural solutions. Supernatural Solutions involve mechanisms from a variety of organisms that can battle these stresses. Supernatural solutions may certainly be very interesting, but what about the ethics behind these superhuman enhancements and their consequences?After loading the project please wait a few seconds for it to load
Link to Final Project
Link to Project "Demo"
Detailed Project Description
The project is structured into two different parts.
First there is the danger information and solution selection component which informs our superhero astronaut of the biggest dangers out there, and then when the danger is pressed, giving him the option to select which characteristic he wants to inherit.
There are two kinds of characteristics. The scientific, which are solutions developed by human scientists through the years, and the supernatural solutions which were developed by living organisms through billions of years of evolution in order to survive. Obviously, anyone can become a superhero, with or without supernatural mechanisms. But while the astronaut goes through these solutions, ethical problems are forming which might generate some complications concerning the mission. Last but not least, are the solution combinations feasible or able to be combined?
The second component consists of 3D planets, that helps the user understand more intuitively our mission and it's steps.
By pressing the small bright planets, the user is informed about the most probable dangers on each kind of trip.
Finally on the right of the screen there can be seen a small form describing our superhero, with an AI generated picture based on the characteristics as well as the characteristics themselves. Lastly our hero will be able to see the outcome of his choices, good or bad, correct or incorrect, ethical or unethical.
Space Agency Data
The https://www.nasa.gov/hrp/5-hazards-of-human-spaceflight gave us a clear insight into the dangers of space travel, while https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/astronauts/space-medicine/concerns.asp helped us understand the immediate effects of the above dangers on human kind and specifically on astronauts.
Hackathon Journey
Our journey began with reading the task description and trying to understand the objectives of our challenge. Initially being 3 students with a computer science background we immediately came up with an idea for a small video game in which the player would build a character to endure the dangers of space travel. Firstly, we had to research and figure out the deadliest stresses during space travel. The Research tab of the challenge provided a good amount of information which our 4th member, a chemical engineer, was quickly able to decipher and sift through. At the same time, two of our computer science engineers were working on making the game as enticing and as interesting as possible while the third was the main bridge of communication between the two fronts. During development, we used a lot of new technologies that we were not very familiar with but through the use of online tutorials and examples, we were able to produce a small demo that contained some of our ideas. In the end, we brought everything together to make a game that is both informative and fun for young ages.
References
https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(20)31457-4#gr1
https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/astronauts/space-medicine/decomp.asp
https://www.issnationallab.org/iss360/mighty-mice-could-lead-new-therapies-muscle-bone-loss-on-earth/
https://www.space.com/mice-muscle-bone-loss-microgravity-myostatin.html
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspas.2016.00023/full