I imagine all of this is more excitement that Astronaut Scott Kelly was anticipating when he signed up to spend a year on the station. If the purpose of the mission is to test his reaction to stress, NASA is doing a great job piling it on.
Update: Speaking of Mr. Kelly, he shared his experiences recently with CBS Evening News. He compared his time on the space station to time in prison:
...no matter what happens, you're not going home. We don't get to go outside, so that's a little bit different. I would imagine in a lot of jails people get fresh air. You don't get that here. And you don't get real sunlight. ... The big difference, though, is we're here by choice. So that makes, I guess, the situation a little bit better.But he also discussed the importance of his research, giving an example concerning why NASA needs to study the impact of long-term space travel on the eyes:
You wouldn't want some astronauts to get on Mars after a year and a half, or longer when they're coming home, and not be able to see...It's something we don't understand, but it's something we're working hard at understanding and mitigating the effects. We've done a lot of research up here since I've been here to better understand that.
