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Human guinea pigs prepare for the world's longest direct flight: 20 hours

For decades, travelers have endured jet lag as an unavoidable menace on long journeys. Now, as airlines push for record-breaking nonstop flights halfway around the planet, efforts to counter the debilitating symptoms are turning into a billion-dollar industry.

Fresh insight into the physical and emotional toll of ultra-long-haul travel should emerge this weekend when Qantas Airways Ltd. flies direct from New York to Sydney. No airline has ever completed that route without stopping. At nearly 20 hours, it's set to be the world's longest flight, leaving the U.S. on Friday and landing in Australia on Sunday morning, Aussie time.

This will be more than an endurance exercise. Scientists and medical researchers in the cabin will turn Qantas' new Boeing Co. Dreamliner into a high-altitude laboratory. They'll screen the brains of the pilots for alertness while monitoring the food consumption, sleep and activity of the few dozen passengers. The aim is to see how humans hold up to the ordeal.

The proliferation of super-long flights — Singapore Airlines Ltd. resumed nonstop services to New York last year — is partly driven by the development of lighter, more aerodynamic aircraft that can fly farther.

The physical burden on customers is putting a renewed focus on jet lag and creating a supermarket of products and homemade creations to ease the suffering. In that shopping basket: melatonin tablets, Pfizer Inc.'s antianxiety medication Xanax, and Propeaq light-emitting glasses that claim to get the body back on track. And yes, there's an app for that and many other potential remedies.

The potential customer base is staggering. The International Air Transport Assn. expects some 4.6 billion people to take a flight in 2019, a total that will jump to 8.2 billion in 2037.

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