• by Les Luchter , Staff Writer, July 20, 2023

"In October 2022, two menstrual cups launched toward space,” began a blurb from Newswise earlier this week

That line was so good I just had to borrow it to lead off this column.

But credit must go to Kate Blackwood, who wrote the “Cornell Chronicle” article distributed by the wire service.

Blackwood, naturally, focused on Cornell University researcher Lígia Fonseca Coelho, who co-designed the “AstroCup payload project” that would be carried into space for a few minutes on board a Portuguese rocket.

We, on the other hand, were drawn to D2C marketer Lunette, whose menstrual cups were selected for the space flight by the AstroCup team.

Why Lunette?

It was chosen “because we share the same values of sustainability, education and inclusivity,” the AstroCup team wrote on Instagram. “The brand has donated over 30,000 cups through various organizations, and they consistently participate in actions of education about menstruation around the world.”

Now, after experiencing time in microgravity, “we know that cups made by Lunette, and probably other brands, are very resilient in the turbulence and microgravity of a rocket launch,” Coelho told Blackwood.

This is especially important because “Women’s health in space is an understudied area of research,” according to Coehlo. “Certain topics, such as menstruation, are taboo, so we don’t talk about it, and if we don’t talk about it, people are not going to invest in it.”

Coehlo, who before working in astrobiology was a cancer researcher and invented a urinary tract infection diagnosis kit that could be useful for long space missions, said she started working on the menstrual cup project in 2019 after learning that reusable, sustainable menstrual solutions weren’t part of space agency planning for future astronauts, “who may be out in space for years.”

“If you say to a woman, ‘you have to put your reproductive system on hold for five years and this is the only way you can go to Mars,’ we are going to have problems,” she told Blackwood.

“Most astronauts who menstruate stop their periods hormonally before traveling to space,” Blackwood explained. “For long International Space Station missions, they can choose not to, but the only other option currently available, is to pack in disposable pads or tampons and pack out the used products at a considerable cost,” Coehlo said.

The Lunette menstrual cups that flew into space were found to have remained functional through the flight’s turbulence and microgravity.  Next up: testing the cups for long-term exposure to radiation on the International Space Station.

“The experiment was one small step for two menstrual cups,” Blackwell noted, “but a huge leap toward giving options to menstruating astronauts, especially on longer missions to Mars or the moon.”

Meanwhile, we’re wondering how Lunette (which could not be reached for comment) could use this story in its marketing. Perhaps the most obvious idea would be to zero in on the extreme durability the product demonstrated through space travel –an offshoot of the venerable “It takes a licking and keeps on ticking” theme pioneered by Timex back in the 1950s.

Many products have now endured that proverbial trip to the moon and back, including a recent foray into space for Tide, who milked the experience with taglines “Tide’s giant leap into space” and “It just may be the best Tide in the universe.”

But this is the first time the far-traveling product was meant for menstruating humans. So it makes sense to end with the headline from the “Cornell Chronicle” article we began with: “Space-ready menstrual cup a giant leap for womankind.”