“If I could do this in complete anonymity, I certainly would,” he said. “But, obviously, that is not possible.” Pathy, a 52-year-old Montreal businessman and philanthropist, spoke from his hotel’s bright quarantine room outside Orlando, Florida, as he waited for his release. It had already been transported twice since its original date on March 30th. But finally the time has come. If all goes well, Pathy will be launched on top of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket destined for the International Space Station (ISS) on Friday at 11:17 a.m. ET. “I’ve had this fantasy since I was a kid watching Star Trek,” he said via Zoom. “I had a fantasy of traveling in space and bouncing around the universe and meeting new species and discovering new worlds … all these things.” Pathi is not exactly on his way to meet aliens with a crumpled forehead, but he is not on a leisure cruise on the ISS either. Instead, it is part of a four-person crew that includes a former NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegriabusinessman Larry Conor and investor Eytan Stibbe – the first civilian mission to the space station and will be hard at work. The four are part of it Axiom SpaceThe mission of Ax-1. Axiom is a privately funded space company that aims to send commercial missions to the ISS – the Ax-1 being their first – and eventually build the world’s first commercial space station. Pathi’s costume can be seen here. The businessman will be only the second private Canadian citizen to travel in space. In 2009, Cirque de Soleil co-founder Guy Laliberté became the first Canadian space tourist. (SpaceX)
The creation of a space station may seem like a fantastic and unnecessary goal, but the company’s goal, he said, is to conduct research and experiments that can be used not only in space but also here on Earth. And that was part of Pathy’s call to buy a $ 50 million stake. “When I found out we were able to choose research to come with us and finish there, it was just the icing on the cake – that I could really make it a lot more impressive.” But how do you tell your wife and your two children that you are going to get stuck on a rocket, have a controlled explosion and head to a place where no man was destined to live or work? Pathi trained at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. (Robert Markowitz / NASA-Johnson Space Center)
I went home and said to my wife, ‘I think I’re going into space.’ And her first answer was “No, without me you are not,” she said. “But she’m excited about me and my kids were really excited … My parents were skeptical at first, but they became big supporters. And they’re really excited about it.” Pathi knows there are dangers. “I have a young family, so I’m not thinking, ‘Wow, well, you know, I’ve had a good life, but what the hell.’ “I still intend to live a long and fruitful life,” he said. “I’m worried about my safety and I’m worried about my ability to do all these new things and make all these commitments, with research and everything; but at this point, I’m not really worried anymore.”

Demonstration of science fiction technology

Pathy will work hard to conduct 12 research projects, including a two-way Holoportation space technology demonstration, which researchers hope will be useful here on Earth. And if that sounds like something out of Star Trek, it’s because it’s kind of. Star Trek – like many other science fiction shows and movies – often uses holograms or three-dimensional interpretations of people as a means of communication. Pathy’s experiment, meanwhile, will not look like what we see on the big screen. Instead, he and someone else on the ground will wear virtual reality headphones that will function more like augmented reality. The technology is a collaborative effort between Leap Biosystems, Aexa Aerospace and Microsoft. Former Canadian Space Agency astronaut Dave Williams is working with Pathy on this technology and is excited to see where it’s coming from. “Images from the control of the mission to Earth will be sent into space and Mark will see them as if they were in space with him on the International Space Station,” he said. “Most importantly, the images from the space station will be sent to control the mission, so that it appears that Mark is actually in control of the mission with the team on the ground. “It’s an incredible technology that you can only begin to imagine how we can use in the future.” CLOCKS Aexa Aerospace Demonstrates Holoportation: And these future uses could help serve Canadians in a significant way. “If you’re talking about medical care in the Canadian Arctic, no doubt this is an extreme environment with a range of temperatures, there is significant isolation, etc.,” Williams said. “And we want to be able to develop powerful technologies that will work in these remote isolated communities – or in remote areas in space.

Pain in the name of science

Another important experiment is this for chronic pain, something that millions of people experience every day. But its nature, and the role that the brain plays in it, is not fully understood. “When people say that pain is all in your brain, that’s absolutely true. The mind is the most complex organ we have, which is completely unexplored, in many ways,” said Dr. Pablo Ingelmo, anesthesiologist and director. Edwards. Family Interdisciplinary Center for Complex Pain at The Montreal Children’s Hospital, participating in this experiment with Pathy. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is ready to launch on the 39A launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Axiom launch will be the first private crew to visit the International Space Station. (SpaceX)
“As doctors, we confused two concepts. One is the feeling of pain: what I feel in a stimulus that can cause pain, the way I send information to my brain,” he explains. “But pain is a completely different matter. Pain is my reaction, my behavior, my suffering, the expression of this stimulus that causes pain.” An example is those who have fibromyalgia. People with this misunderstood condition experience pain very differently compared to people who do not have the condition. Their body processes even the slightest pain as something more powerful, a process referred to as allodynia. Another is back pain. Of common for astronauts to feel back pain both when they are in space and when they return to Earth. Ingelmo and his team want to better understand the role the brain plays in this and apply that knowledge to patients here on the ground. In order to get a basic line on how Pathi experiences pain, he was beaten and motivated. “They put needles in various parts of my body and asked me to report my level of pain. Both hot and cold, mainly in my arm but also in my lower back,” he said. “It’s not always convenient or comfortable, but I think, look, I’m really happy to have the opportunity to do something positive for society.” Pathy’s family will be watching closely when it is released. There will even be a party. But it is not what he looks forward to. “Personally, I’m more looking forward to the return party.”