Space therapy: Nasa develops computer that helps beat depression

YOUR work is dangerous and your co-workers rely on you to stay alive. But you can never get far from those colleagues. You can’t see your family for months, even years. The food isn’t great. And forget stepping out for some fresh air.

No wonder the adventure of space flight can also be stressful, isolating and depressing. So scientists are working on giving a computer the ability to offer some of the understanding guidance — if not all the warmth — of a human therapist, before psychological problems or interpersonal conflicts compromise a mission.

Clinical tests on the four-year, $1.74 million (€1.4m) project for Nasa, called the Virtual Space Station, are expected to begin in the Boston area by next month. The new programme is nothing like science fiction’s infamous HAL, the onboard artificial intelligence that goes awry in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The Virtual Space Station’s interaction between astronaut and computer is far less sophisticated and far more benevolent.