Effects of Deceleration on Rats exposed to Prolonged Centrifugation

Abstract

PROLONGED exposures of animals to simulated high gravity environments by centrifugation have been reported to repress their normal growth and attainable body mass. Matthews¹ centrifuged rats for more than a year at 3g and found that the body mass of centrifuged rats was appreciably lower than corresponding control animals. Similar effects for shorter exposure periods have been noted by Wunder² with mice and by Smith³ with birds. The latter workers have found that when their animals were removed from the centrifuge the weight of these animals over a period of time approached that of the non-centrifuged controls. This investigation was undertaken to evaluate the effects of both an increase and decrease in gravity on rats adapted to relatively high g by prolonged centrifugation.