It appears that, as usual, everyone is excited about coffee on a Friday morning. Yes the International Space Station now has an espresso machine for the Americans, but the Italians won the race to the first ISSpresso in space and that's not even the most important stuff that arrived today thanks to SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft. And though the coffee may claim the spotlight, the nanotech, food and mice (yes, we said mice in space) are the really important things aboard this NASA payload.
4,300 pounds of cargo is currently being unloaded aboard the International Space Station, and aside from the espresso machine, here's a few other things that made it aboard with the interest of science and survival at heart:
FOOD-This one is the most important, and predominantly the largest. To keep our astronauts in tip-top shape, NASA has sent specially formulated diets plus sweet and savory treats to meet our astronauts' diverse culinary interests. Now they may not be able to go around town to every farmers market while their orbiting the Earth, but that doesn't mean that they can't be foodies-and these astronauts are.
Crystal-Growth Studies-Courtesy of Merck Laboratories researcher, Paul Reichert, the International Space Station will now seek to create more uniform, larger crystals of pharmaceutical medications for a new class of drugs known as "biologics".
Synthetic Muscles (Electroactive Polymers)-The synthetic muscle polymers are of great interest to the development of robotic arms, but researchers would like to know how they fare against metal in the field. So for the next 80 days they will stay aboard the International Space Station to test their resistance against radiation.
20 Mice-Yes, mice in space. These rodents are coming aboard as part of an ongoing study where the mice will aid researchers in investigating the affect microgravity will have on bones. Crewmembers will X-ray the mice and then dissect them to gather their results.
Optic Equipment For Eye Examinations-Several astronauts in the past on long-term missions have developed serious eye problems that researchers believe may be caused by the buildup of fluids within the head on account of microgravity conditions. And now that the International Space Station is home to the first ever one-year mission team, NASA and the directors of their Life and Physical Sciences Division would like to know how and when these problems might arise.
This, plus other components sent aboard today, will aid in NASA's one-year comparison between International Space Station crewmember Scott Kelly, and his former-astronaut twin brother Mark. As part of the one-year study the twin brothers are a vital component of coming to find out just how long-term life in space can affect the human body.
"It's allowing us to make a leap from missions of six months to a year, and project out what we need to do to protect humans over longer periods of time" director of NASA's Life and Physical Sciences Division, Marshall Porterfield says.
