Summer Mission to Station Will Include Tissue Growth By Kelly Young FLORIDA TODAY posted: 02:35 pm ET 04 May 2001 ET
Summer Mission to Station Will Include Tissue Growth
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Once construction of Space Station Alpha has slowed, researchers not only want the astronauts to devote more time to research, they want them to prepare some of the experiments in space themselves.
Currently, experiments come packed and practically ready to go on the shuttle. Astronauts and cosmonauts may install them in the proper place and check on them once in a while. But most of their time is spent on station maintenance, highlighted by computer problems that dominated the mission last week.
"We want to transition to doing some actual molecular and cell biology on orbit," said John Love, whose
biotechnology experiments will be onboard the station this summer. Love attended Thursday's Space Congress.
Growing tissues on Earth can be challenging because the cells cling to the bottom of petri dishes in a single layer. Growing cells in a nearly gravity-free environment would mean that they could develop into three-dimensional structures, much like they do in the human body.
Love previewed some of
the science experiments to be launched on the shuttle missions to Space Station Alpha in June and November.
Some of the June tissue-engineering experiments will look at colon and ovarian cancer cell growth.
To supplement these early experiments, two refrigerator-size racks of experiments and equipment for biotechnology are scheduled to be sent to the station in 2006 and 2008, near station completion.
"With the shuttle, to repeat an experiment, sometimes you have to wait for years," Love said. With the station, researchers could try to repeat experiments in quick succession.
Howard Levine, with Dynamac Corp., outlined some of the station's early experiments, which essentially were test-runs that taught researchers how to do science on the station.
Soybean and corn seeds were grown for a week on the station in January. Early results indicate that there are few hurdles to getting seeds to sprout in space, he said. Levine said he is now involved in looking how to efficiently fertilize plants in space.
advertisement
