BioServe Space Technologies

MicroQuin's revolutionary work on the International Space Station National Laboratory has been featured in the ISS Upward magazine (Article link: https://lnkd.in/emDqFaJk) I could not be more grateful for the work done by BioServe Space Technologies. A massive thank you to Luis Zea, who's unwavering efforts made this possible!! MicroQuin will be publishing how our technologies can transform cancer treatment with minimal/no treatment toxicity in the very near future (article accepted - awaiting date for publication)

It has been a publication-heavy few months! ICYMI, researchers that we worked with to get their experiment conducted onboard the International Space Station National Laboratory using our hardware, expertise, and operations have published: Arun Sharma and his team from Cedars-Sinai have shown that induced pluripotent stem cells can be grown, maintained, and transfected in both 2D and 3D conditions in microgravity laying the groundwork for future biomanufacturing in space: https://lnkd.in/gKevsNbb Deok-Ho Kim and his team from The Johns Hopkins University and University of Washington have shown that in microgravity heart beats are half as strong and arrhythmia (times between beats) is up to 5 times longer: https://lnkd.in/eEsp7emB Ngan Huang and her team from Stanford University and Palo Alto Veterans Institute for Research have shown that impaired muscle myogenesis (formation) can be recreated in microgravity (after just one week) and be used to identify potential drug targets. https://lnkd.in/giD_qhz2

Today Butch Wilmore 👨🚀 completed the last run of our Gaucho Lung experiment onboard the International Space Station National Laboratory. PI Emilie Dressaire 👩🔬 and her team from UC Santa Barbara 🎓 are looking how fluid wicks in gel-coated tubes of different diameters without the confounding effects of gravity. Even though this is a physical 🧪 experiment in space 🚀, it has a biological 🧫 application on Earth 🌍: it could help to administrate drugs to newborns 👶 with underdeveloped lungs 🫁 that are experience respiratory distress syndrome. https://lnkd.in/gRq8rhMh

Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) are one of the most demanding cells to grow on Earth - yet they hold great potential for developing therapies to cure diseases here on Earth. Together with Arun Sharma and his team from Cedars-Sinai we have now grown them successfully in space onboard the Axiom Space's Ax-2 mission onboard the International Space Station National Laboratory as a first step. Next step: Scaling this up so we can produce stem cells in space!

Can you imagine measuring the pulse 📈 and strength 🏋♀️ of tiny beating heart muscles 💓 in space 🌌 for 26 days? We did it and the results are out: As the Smithsonian Institution nicely summarized, our partners Deok-Ho Kim, Devin Mair, and Jonathan Tsui, PhD from John Hopkins University have found that "the heart tissues had grown to beat half as strongly as the Earth-bound samples, and the period between beats stretched to five times longer. Heartbeat irregularity, known as arrhythmia, can cause heart failure, but the tissue’s contractions regained a normal cadence after returning to Earth. On a molecular level, sarcomeres—proteins that aid contraction—were shorter and disordered after space exposure, and cells’ mitochondria, responsible for energy production, had become deformed." Read the full publication here: https://lnkd.in/eEsp7emB

Announcing our 4th mission to space - and the first to reprogram fibroblasts into iPSCs in microgravity!! Can't wait to see the results... Thanks to our partners at Axiom Space, BioServe Space Technologies and the Allen Institute for Brain Science. https://lnkd.in/gC2SzW2f

Some exciting space research news was just announced at the ISS Research and Development Conference! Three of the five research teams, selected to develop and fly their cancer research investigations, intend to work with BioServe Space Technologies, who will provide engineering and logistical support to prepare the projects for spaceflight and successful operations on station. https://lnkd.in/gD5Qmbf5

Here is a look at the people, behind the scenes and the hardware being put together, in preparation for NG-21. Support hardware kits have been built, circuit cards designed, soldered and calibrated. Bioreactors have been assembled. We are ready to grow stem cells on ISS. In this investigation, BioServe aims to develop a novel stem cell expansion bioreactor (BICEP) and protocols for its use in space. BICEP will leverage BioServe’s proven hardware from past missions for various cell and tissue culture investigations while complying with federal and industry standards. Following validation in this first phase, the team plans to build upon this work through future investigations on the space station. This project was selected through NASA’s 2022 InSPA Research Announcement and was sponsored by the ISS National Lab.

This research with Kidney Chips is a prime example of what BioServe can do: ⚗️Developed, flight certified, and manufactured an automated tissue chips system from scratch in only 18 months 🧑🔧Reduced the volume compared to terrestrial tissue chip systems by a factor of 8 🧫Launched live cells successfully twice despite challenges such as significant launch delays on the very first flight 👩🚀Worked closely with NASA to implement the experiment under tight timing, temperature, and CO2 tolerances 🔬Worked closely with the research team to always prioritize the demanding science leading to not just one but several peer review publications