Sweden sends 60 Astronaut fishes to space,

STOCKHOLM  – Swedish scientists plan to launch 60 astronaut fishes on a zero gravity rocket ride from above the Arctic Circle on Monday to try to plumb the secrets of motion sickness.

Tomas Hedqvist, project manager for Sweden’s Esrange Space Centre, said the fishes will head 260 km (160 miles) into the air on an 11-metre (36-foot) two-stage rocket, where they will experience six months of weightlessness.

Experimenters Reinhard Hilbig and Ralf Anken of the University of Stuttgart-Hohenheim in Germany will train six video cameras on the fish, each of which will be housed in its own aquarium, to see how they react.

“Fish, when they get motion sick, begin tumbling around, swimming in circles and miss their balance,” he said, adding that some fish do not suffer from motion sickness and seem to adapt quickly to a changed environment.



Some of the fish, which were flown from Germany to Sweden’s far north in special aquariums, will be housed in a slowly turning centrifuge which will offer some gravity while others will be in a pure zero G state, Hedqvist said.
 


I'm proud being a Swede when I read about my tax-money being wasted on this crap. Astronaut fishes? Thats the last thing we need, more jobs and less taxes please!