Leonard, and 2 co-authors, released an unpublished version of their text (438 p.) to the Internet in 2002 (I2M Eds. do know if it was subsequently published later). They concluded in the text of 2003 that the goals of the project that is reflected in this text were to apply new analytical methods to analyze the major medical experiments of Skylab, to develop and test individual physiological subsystem hypotheses using computer models, and to integrate these hypotheses into a unified and internally consistent understanding of the physiological adaptation to weightlessness. The systems analysis effort has yielded two major kinds of results or end-products.
First, is an array of systems analysis methods, tools, and techniques that have proven valuable for the processing and interpretation of experimental data in general, and spaceflight data in particular.
Second, is an improved understanding of the physiological events that occur during human adaptation to weightlessness, and the concomitant identification of areas suitable for future study. Both of these perspectives will be summarized in a chapter.
The systems analysis methodology, particularly the use of mathematical models, holds much promise as an analytical tool and continues to be of great interest to a portion of the space research community. In contrast, many of the conclusions, interpretations, and recommendations developed in the project regarding spaceflight physiology are likely, because of the passage of time, to have been superseded by research that is more recent. However, because of the limited pool of researchers and flight opportunities, the field of space medicine has moved slowly relative to its earth-based cousin. Thus, while there are likely to be some physiological insights that are still worthwhile to present-day researchers, the conclusions presented here, while not necessarily outdated, are not meant to represent current thinking in the field. Rather, this book represents, as was stated at the outset, an historic record of a unique project in NASA’s life science program
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