• Question: Have you sent a monkey into space

    Asked by 495tund44 to Ross, Robert, Hussain, Gemma on 6 Nov 2015.
    • Photo: Ross King

      Ross King answered on 6 Nov 2015:

      I have never sent a monkey into space and I have no plans at this stage to do so! Also, lots of monkeys have been sent into space (or the bit just below space) and I think most probably didn’t come back in one piece, so I’m not sure I’d really want to do this – it’d be a bit of a stretch for the work I do in the lab 😛

    • Photo: Hussain Jaffery

      Hussain Jaffery answered on 7 Nov 2015:

      This is a really cool question.

      I don’t personally work on space-related or monkey-related work, but I do know that nowadays, space monkeys are rare.

      That said, back in the early Space Race (around 1950s-1960s) monkeys and apes were sent out into space in small rockets. This was in order to test out the how the very difficult and hostile environment of space would affect future human astronauts who would be sent soon after. The most recent case is of Iran sending a monkey into space in 2013, but most countries only send satellites, robot explorers and humans into space.

      I am not sure what the monkeys thought of it all, I know I would be up for it!

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