ISS National Lab News Conference

I was able to sit in on an ISS National Lab News Conference this morning. Most of the conference was concentrated around a few main subjects including: the continued success of the ISS National Lab, new experimental equipment and experiments being deployed, and increased commercial involvement.

When the installation of the Kibo module is completed the International Space Station will be 70% complete. To date there have been 157 experiments, or investigations, with 97 of those completed. These investigations have supported 646 scientists with 125 publications to date.

Soon to be installed are a combustion integrated experiment rack and a refrigerated experiment rack that can maintain temperatures of 80 degrees below zero. With the completion of Kibo and later ISS there will be approximately a 50% surplus capacity for commercial experimentation around 2010. During this morning’s conference NASA announced partnerships with the University of Colorado at Boulder’s Bioserve Space Technologies Center, SPACEHAB, and Zero Gravity Inc.

A SPACEHAB experiment has been stowed aboard Discovery for launch tomorrow. The project’s goal is to create a vaccine against salmonella, a major killer of children and elderly worldwide. Micro gravity provides a unique experimentation environment where the bacteria become extremely potent. In order to develop a weak enough version of salmonella for a vaccine, the bacteria have been genetically altered here on Earth. The altered bacteria will be administered to caenorhabditis, a nematode roundworm, to study the affects of the newly created form of salmonella.

NASA has high hopes for future commercial partnerships. Deputy manager of NASA’s Space Station Payloads Office John Uri was quoted as saying “I’m sure you’ve heard the expression, ‘Build it and they will come.’ Well, we’re still building it, and they’re already coming.”

video of today’s conference .

Scott

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