 News & Announcements
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Hello, Space Biology Supporter!
NASA's Artemis III LEAF Mission to Grow Plants on the Moon
 The space biology experiment “Lunar Effects on Agricultural Flora (LEAF)” was one of three research experiments NASA selected to be developed for deployment on the Moon as part of the agency's Artemis III mission. LEAF is a fully autonomous plant growth chamber that will protect the plants from the vacuum of space. The experiment will investigate the lunar surface environment’s effects on space crops and will be the first study on the Moon that will directly measure plant development and growth starting from a seed, photosynthesis, and systemic stress responses in space radiation and partial gravity.
Plant growth and development data, along with radiation dosimetry and environmental data, will help scientists understand the impact of the Moon's environment on plants. These lunar plant studies will generate new knowledge that will be used to grow plants for human nutrition and develop plant-based life support systems on the Moon and beyond. The LEAF growth chamber will house red and green varieties of Brassica rapa (Wisconsin Fast Plants®), Wolffia (duckweed), and Arabidopsis thaliana. Seedling samples will be returned to Earth by the Artemis crew for the research team to study plant responses to the lunar environment at a molecular level.
LEAF is led by Christine Escobar of Space Lab Technologies, LLC, in Boulder, Colorado. LEAF is co-sponsored by NASA's Science Mission Directorate's Exploration Science Strategy and Integration Office and Biological and Physical Sciences Division/Space Biology Program.
Why Do We Need to Grow Plants in Space?
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 Spaceflight News
GEARS Mission Completes Mission Operations
 The Genomic Enumeration of Antibiotic Resistance in Space (GEARS) project successfully completed on-orbit genomic sequencing of microbes isolated from the ISS on April 29.
All experiment slides were safely returned to Earth on SpaceX-30. The slides with the microbial samples from the GEARS spaceflight experiment were retrieved from the cold stow team and successfully transferred to the Johnson Space Center (JSC) Microbiology Laboratory on May 4.
The JSC team will work to subculture and identify all microorganisms present. The isolates will also be archived. Additionally, comparison of the returned plates to the photos obtained in-flight is in work (prior to crew manipulation of the colonies). The Co-Investigator team is conducting the preliminary screening of retrieval of bacteria.
GEARS is a series of four experiments that will survey the space station for antibiotic resistant organisms. On-board sequencing of isolates aims to show how these bacteria adapt to the space environment, providing knowledge that informs measures to protect astronauts on future long-duration missions.
Image: On-orbit sequencing of microbes isolated from the ISS for the GEARS mission.
BRIC-25 Microbiology Specimens Return from ISS
 The Biological Research in Canisters-25 (BRIC-25) Staphylococcus aureus bacterial samples were returned from the ISS on SpaceX-30. The BRIC-25 experiment was conducted on the ISS in February 2024 to compare spaceflight effects on the S. aureus wildtype strain to the Accessory Gene Regulator (Agr) mutant strain. The study was designed to test whether the S. aureus Agr quorum-sensing system regulates biofilm formation, physiology, and virulence factor expression when it is exposed to microgravity or other variables related to the spaceflight environment.
The results could refine predictions about the risk that the S. aureus pathogen poses to astronauts during flight and help protect their health on future missions.
Image: An ISS crew member prepares to initiate the experiment by adding growth media to the BRIC-25 canister.
Mission Success! MABL-A Experiment Samples Returned from ISS
The Microgravity Associated Bone Loss-A (MABL-A) study, led by Dr. Abba Zubair from the Mayo Clinic, focuses on evaluating the effect of microgravity on osteogenic differentiation and the impact of age and gender on the Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) capacity to secrete cytokines under microgravity conditions. Twelve (12) donor cell lines were launched on NG-20 in January 2024. After growing in space for 17 days, the cells were preserved, frozen and returned to Earth on SpaceX-30. Dr. Zubair will now begin analyzing the samples.
 This ISS flight experiment was funded by a Space Biology grant to Abba Zubair, Ph.D. of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, for a study titled, "Role of Mesenchymal Stem Cells in Microgravity Induced Bone Loss."
RR-20 ISS Mission Completes Post-Flight Operations
The Rodent Research-20 (RR-20) spaceflight investigation that was launched on SpaceX-29 November 9, 2023 recently completed all post-flight mission operations. Frozen tissue samples from RR-20 were returned on SpaceX-30 and have been delivered to the Principal Investigator's laboratory at University of Kansas Medical Center. Principal Investigator Dr. Lane Christenson and his team will analyze the tissues to study the effects of the spaceflight on the female reproductive system and hormone-responsive tissues such as femur. Additional tissues will be processed by the self-forming Biospecimen Sharing Program (BSP) team and the Ames BSP team and will become available for the science community.
The research from Dr. Christenson's Laboratory advances previous microgravity studies that seek to better understand the combined effects of spaceflight, nutritional, and environmental stresses on control of ovulation and resulting effects on the skeleton. Results of this study could help identify and treat the effects of stress on ovulation and improve bone health on Earth.
 The RR-20 ISS experiment was funded by a Space Biology grant to Dr. Lane Christenson of the University of Kansas Medical Center for his proposal titled, "Female Reproductive Health: Space Flight Induced Ovarian and Estrogen Signaling Dysfunction, Adaptation, and Recovery."
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 New Discoveries
Multi-Drug Resistant Bacteria Found aboard the ISS Are Mutating
 In a new paper published by Dr. Kasthuri Venkateswaran of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, strains of the bacterial species Enterobacter bugandensis isolated from the ISS were studied. Thirteen strains of E. bugandensis, a bacterium notorious for being multi-drug resistant, were isolated from the ISS. Study findings indicate that under stress, the ISS isolated strains were mutated and had become genetically and functionally distinct compared to their Earth counterparts. The strains were able to viably persist in the ISS over time with increasingly larger populations. E. bugandensis coexisted with multiple other microorganisms, and in some cases could have helped those organisms survive.
Closed human-built environments, such as the ISS, are unique areas that provide an extreme environment subject to microgravity, radiation, and elevated carbon dioxide levels. Any microorganisms introduced to these areas must adapt to thrive. By delving into microbial dynamics in extreme environments, this research opens doors to effective preventative measure for astronaut health. The paper is available online.
This study was funded by Space Biology to Dr. Kasthuri Venkateswaran of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for a grant titled, "ISS Microbial Observatory-A Genetic Approach".
Housing Temperature Affects Bone Loss in Mice
May 8, 2024 - Space Biology funded Principal Investigator Dr. Russell Turner of Oregon State University delivered a presentation summarizing his findings from his grant study, “Housing Temperature: An Important Variable for Simulated Spaceflight Studies Using Mice.”
 In a virtual scientific seminar, Dr. Turner shared an overview of his findings, which focused on the critical role of housing temperature in simulated spaceflight studies using mice. His work demonstrates that mice experience bone loss from cold stress when housed at temperatures that are comfortable for humans (22° C). Mice adapt to temperatures that are slightly too cold for them through a process called adaptive thermogenesis. He and his team also ran tests to determine the lowest possible temperature for housing mice that would halt cold stress-related bone loss - 26°C – a 4° increase in environmental temperature. Findings from this research indicate changes in adaptive thermogenesis have major impacts on bone metabolism, especially in mechanical unloading conditions from simulated microgravity, as well as from spaceflight conditions.
Image: Representative microCT scans of bones in this study showing the loss of cancellous (spongy bone) in mice housed at 22°C, which causes cold stress.
 Dr. Russell Turner is Professor and Director of the Skeletal Biology Laboratory housed in the School of Nutrition and Public Health, College of Health, Oregon State University. His primary research focus is regulation of energy balance with the goal of better understanding how energy homeostasis influences skeletal growth and turnover. Gravitational physiology has been a long-standing interest, and he has participated in numerous simulated microgravity and spaceflight studies.
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Biospecimen Sharing Program
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ISS Rodent Mission Samples Coming to NBISC
Members of the Biospecimen Sharing Program (BSP) team supported the Rodent Research-28 (RR-28) dissections at Kennedy Space Center after the return of SpaceX-30 on April 29. The RR-28 mission, sponsored by the ISS National Laboratory, sent forty mice to the International Space Station (ISS) for over 30 days to test a novel gene therapy to investigate the effectiveness of this treatment for dry macular degeneration.
The samples have been delivered to the NBISC team at Ames Research Center and are in the process of being ingested into the storage archive. These samples will be available for request after this process has been completed over the next few weeks and all sample and subject metadata has been compiled. The joint dissection operations between Space Biology BSP and the ISS National Laboratory-sponsored mission are the first since 2018 and hopefully kickoff many more future collaborations!
Help NASA maximize the scientific return from biological spaceflight investigations and encourage broader participation of the research community in space biology-related research. Non-human biospecimens are dissected, collected, and preserved by the Space Biology Biospecimen Sharing Program (BSP) team from NASA Ames Research Center (ARC). These biospecimens and associated Metadata are made available through NASA’s Biological Institutional Scientific Collection (NBISC). They are searchable and available for request on the Life Sciences Data Archive public website. Flight and ground control biospecimens are available from COSMOS, NASA’s space shuttle missions, and International Space Station (ISS) investigations.
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