We've chosen "The Isolation Solution" because, as Nasa, we believe that the isolation is one of the most alarming problems brought, either by the quarantine, or in space.
With that in mind, we studied NASA and other agencies data in search for the worsts ramifications of the confinement. As a result of that exploration, we've found that the human touch is one of the most powerful tools to create and maintain connections between humans.
In a world where people cannot touch each other, we decided to make something that fills that lack of a touch.
Thereby, we developed an app that makes it possible for you to touch and feel, through pulsations, the people you love, and reminding them that you love them.
Knowing that the people you love thought of you and having the possibility to receiving and feeling on your arm their heartbeat is the piece of connection missing nowadays.
In that way, we believe that our idea can make living in isolation easier, adressing really well the chellenge.
To start, we searched for a challenge that all team members liked and were interested in participating in order to propose something relevant for the current moment.
In order to do that, we selected challenge 10, "a solution for isolation", because it is a theme that we believe to be extremely necessary to reduce the cases of COVID-19 in Brazil and in the world.
However, isolation has brought many changes in people's daily lives and the difficulty of living in confinement leads to a significant increase in physical and mental problems, that astronauts have always had experienced.
With this scenario in mind, we started a brainstorm, using the Miro app and our Discord channel, to list the main problems encountered due to lack of contact with other humans and with the outside world, among them, the lack of the contact and the human touch.
Based on that, we dove deep on research about the influence of the touch in people's health and how the lack of it could increase the rates of depression, stress and anxiety, which, consequently ended up also affecting these people's immunity.
At this point, we deepened our research seeking to know how astronauts fell living so many times in isolation and this led us to our first difficulty, finding data on the psychological health of astronauts.
It was through mentoring and more research on the topic that we obtained a solution that helped us get closer to the ones we love, and that could make us fell accompanied even in space.
Due to the impossibility of having physical human touch, we conclude that bringing this concept to the virtual life would allow a lot of people to transmit their emotions and sensations to other people in any moment.
We analysed NASA data that refers to the life of astronauts in an International Space Station: how they are trained before the take-off and their difficulties of living isolated in space.
The psychological concern, as it shows in Psychology Today, is the main topic when it comes to their quality of life once they are living in an extremely stressful situation.
Loneliness is harmful not only for your mental health, but also for your physical health, specially for your immunity system.
University of Miami studies show that the human touch is responsible for decreasing blood pressure, increaseing oxytocin levels, and can be affective for fighting anxiety and depression, wich means having a better quality of life
ScienceDirect made studies about what are the effects of social isolation and stress and how they interfere in the physiological response of NASA astronauts.
It was because of these studies, and depositions from NASA astronauts, that we could gather the perception needed for understanding the central problem that Sent Touch wants to solve.
We worked to fulfill the needs of this professionals in missions, but also we wanted to amplify the scale and thinking about people isolated due to the COVID-19 quarantine.
The technology makes it easier than never to keep in touch. Beyond that, the data and articles examined by the our crew show that the touch influences in decision making, affectivity, in the sensation of company and happiness, all meaningful factors for those who are in confinement, whenever it is on earth or in space
link Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/home-in-the-cosmos/201902/astronauts-open-about-depression-and-isolation-in-space
link ScienceDirect: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010440X15000905
complementary links: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/conquering-the-challenge-of-isolation-in-space-nasa-s-human-research-program-director
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPinASEKA_I&feature=youtu.be
https://www.history.com/news/biosphere-2-spaceship-earth
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576517316855