Off-Beat-News
Worms do duty in space─── 08:07 Sat, 07 Apr 2018
London - Thousands of baby worms will be sent into space later this year to help a study into muscle loss in older people.
BBC reports that scientists at the University of Exeter in Devon say nematodes are being used because they have a similar muscle structure to humans.
Astronauts lose about 40% of muscle mass after 180 days while aboard the International Space Station (ISS).
It's hoped the research could help people with conditions including muscular dystrophy and diabetes.
The worms - a nematode species called Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) - will blast off in a rocket from the Kennedy Space Centre, Florida, on 29 November and travel 402km to the ISS.
They are useful to scientists studying long-term changes in human physiology because they suffer from muscle loss under many of the same conditions that people do.
BBC