While a foam mold of each astronaut's body shape could accomplish this, any movement would take a person out of this position and create incorrect pressure points against the body. Instead, they created a new foam material that was visco-elastic and therefore able to conform to a person's shape, but then come back to a normal shape once pressure was removed from the foam. This could allow an even distribution of pressure or body weight over the entire surface of the foam, but quickly adapt to any movements of the body.

With this amazing discovery, Fagerdala World Foams of Sweden, one of Europe's largest foam producing companies, began experiments in the 1980s to perfect it for consumer use. With the success of Tempur-Pedic®, other foam manufacturers in Canada and the United States began to develop their own visco-elastic memory foam material to offer mattress, upholstering and specialty product companies the ability to allow consumers to have a variety of options and price levels to choose from.