Yeast Committed To The Moon Will Provide Clues About How Radiation Affects Astronauts

A team of researchers led by CU Boulder is sending some unexpected hitchhikers to the moon: Twelve bags filled with baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), the same kind of hard-working cells that make bread rise and ferment beer and wine. As early as Friday, a rocket taller than the Statue of Liberty is scheduled to blast off from a launch pad in Florida, carrying NASA’s new Orion space capsule into Earth orbit for the first time. From there, the spacecraft, designed to carry four astronauts, will begin a 42-day journey to the Moon and back to Earth. There are no humans on this mission, called Artemis 1. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be passengers. Three human mannequins, named Moonikin Campos, Helga and Zohar, will fly aboard Orion — as will four biological experiments, including one designed by a team at BioServe Space Technologies, a center in the Ann and HJ Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences. The experiment is hidden under one of the seats in a case the size of a shoebox. Inside, millions of yeast cells will help scientists answer a critical question in space exploration: How human bodies might fare in the extreme environment of deep space, where astronauts could be exposed to thousands of chest X-rays worth of radiation. every trip. “Nothing like this has happened in 50 years,” said Tobias Niederwieser, a research associate at BioServe and an engineer on the team. “The last time humans sent anything biological on a return trip to the Moon was during Apollo 17 in 1972.” But it’s also just the beginning. Artemis 1 is the first step in NASA’s new era of lunar exploration. The space agency plans to launch human astronauts, including the first woman, to the surface of the Moon later this decade. Researchers at BioServe strive to keep these lunar explorers safe. Once the yeast cultures return to Earth, the team will retrieve the cells to study their DNA—and potentially find clues that could help scientists prevent or treat the effects of radiation sickness in astronauts. Luis Zea, a former researcher at BioServe now at Colorado-based Sierra Space, is leading the project. He said it made him look at the moon in a new way. “I don’t see it the same,” Zea said. “Because I know Orion will soon be orbiting it with the hardware and science we’ve been working on for four years.” Away from home For Zea and his colleagues, this experiment, officially called Deep Space Radiation Genomics (DSRG), has been a long time coming. For nearly 35 years, BioServe researchers have helped fly hundreds of biological experiments into space. Most of them have traveled to the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits about 250 miles above Earth. Credit: NASA Orion is a different kind of laboratory. For starters, the spacecraft flies much farther—hundreds of thousands of miles farther. In the process, it will travel past Earth’s Van Allen belts, a pair of doughnut-shaped radiation belts that surround the planet and shield it from the sun’s most dangerous rays. And unlike the experiments on the ISS, there will be no astronauts to help run the DSRG. “The whole experiment is battery powered,” Niederwieser said. “We can’t get data from it. We can’t send it a signal to tell it when to start.” Instead, Niederwieser and his team designed the shoebox-sized lab to automatically detect when it’s far enough from Earth and then activate. Once this happens, small pumps will fill the yeast sacs with a nutrient-rich liquid and the cells will begin to grow and reproduce. Yeast cells themselves are an engineering marvel. Working with researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada, the BioServe team grew about 12,000 mutant strains of yeast for the experiment. Some of these organisms are missing certain genes, while others carry extra copies of these same code fragments. Researchers from the German Aerospace Center and the Universidad de Valle de Guatemala also contributed to the effort. More than a dozen students have taken part in the experiment, including four from CU Boulder. Which of these mutants survives the trip to the moon and which doesn’t could give scientists new clues about how radiation might affect human astronauts. Zea explained that yeast cells may not look much like large primates, but they share about 70% of their genes with humans. These cultures, in other words, will provide a window into how certain genes, or mechanisms for repairing damaged genes, may be critical to helping organisms survive the rigors of space. “What we may be able to do is give future space explorers drugs that enhance the efficiency of these DNA repair mechanisms,” Zea said. “It’s kind of like an antioxidant that will help moderate the effects of radiation.” I’m coming home However, before that happens, the team will need to wait — and wait. The trip to Orion is only the first leg of the experiment. Researchers want to know how space radiation affects microbes. To tease this out, BioServe will grow identical yeast cultures on the International Space Station and on the ground in Boulder. The box itself in Orion has a long journey ahead of it. Niederwiser and Zea delivered the experiment to NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in mid-August. Once Orion comes back to Earth later this fall, Colorado researchers will have to wait for a team to retrieve the capsule and its biological experiments. “It’s especially annoying because we won’t know if the unit has worked as it should until we get the box back in two or three months,” Niederwieser said. However, he and his colleagues are confident that the tiny space explorers will not let them down. Scientist sends yeast and algae into space on Artemis 1 Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder Reference: Moon-bound yeast will provide clues to how radiation affects astronauts (2022, August 30) Retrieved August 31, 2022, from
This document is subject to copyright. Except for any fair dealing for purposes of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without written permission. Content is provided for informational purposes only.

title: “Yeast Committed To The Moon Will Provide Clues About How Radiation Affects Astronauts Klmat” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-01” author: “Gene Davis”

A team of researchers led by CU Boulder is sending some unexpected hitchhikers to the moon: Twelve bags filled with baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), the same kind of hard-working cells that make bread rise and ferment beer and wine. As early as Friday, a rocket taller than the Statue of Liberty is scheduled to blast off from a launch pad in Florida, carrying NASA’s new Orion space capsule into Earth orbit for the first time. From there, the spacecraft, designed to carry four astronauts, will begin a 42-day journey to the Moon and back to Earth. There are no humans on this mission, called Artemis 1. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be passengers. Three human mannequins, named Moonikin Campos, Helga and Zohar, will fly aboard Orion — as will four biological experiments, including one designed by a team at BioServe Space Technologies, a center in the Ann and HJ Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences. The experiment is hidden under one of the seats in a case the size of a shoebox. Inside, millions of yeast cells will help scientists answer a critical question in space exploration: How human bodies might fare in the extreme environment of deep space, where astronauts could be exposed to thousands of chest X-rays worth of radiation. every trip. “Nothing like this has happened in 50 years,” said Tobias Niederwieser, a research associate at BioServe and an engineer on the team. “The last time humans sent anything biological on a return trip to the Moon was during Apollo 17 in 1972.” But it’s also just the beginning. Artemis 1 is the first step in NASA’s new era of lunar exploration. The space agency plans to launch human astronauts, including the first woman, to the surface of the Moon later this decade. Researchers at BioServe strive to keep these lunar explorers safe. Once the yeast cultures return to Earth, the team will retrieve the cells to study their DNA—and potentially find clues that could help scientists prevent or treat the effects of radiation sickness in astronauts. Luis Zea, a former researcher at BioServe now at Colorado-based Sierra Space, is leading the project. He said it made him look at the moon in a new way. “I don’t see it the same,” Zea said. “Because I know Orion will soon be orbiting it with the hardware and science we’ve been working on for four years.” Away from home For Zea and his colleagues, this experiment, officially called Deep Space Radiation Genomics (DSRG), has been a long time coming. For nearly 35 years, BioServe researchers have helped fly hundreds of biological experiments into space. Most of them have traveled to the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits about 250 miles above Earth. Credit: NASA Orion is a different kind of laboratory. For starters, the spacecraft flies much farther—hundreds of thousands of miles farther. In the process, it will travel past Earth’s Van Allen belts, a pair of doughnut-shaped radiation belts that surround the planet and shield it from the sun’s most dangerous rays. And unlike the experiments on the ISS, there will be no astronauts to help run the DSRG. “The whole experiment is battery powered,” Niederwieser said. “We can’t get data from it. We can’t send it a signal to tell it when to start.” Instead, Niederwieser and his team designed the shoebox-sized lab to automatically detect when it’s far enough from Earth and then activate. Once this happens, small pumps will fill the yeast sacs with a nutrient-rich liquid and the cells will begin to grow and reproduce. Yeast cells themselves are an engineering marvel. Working with researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada, the BioServe team grew about 12,000 mutant strains of yeast for the experiment. Some of these organisms are missing certain genes, while others carry extra copies of these same code fragments. Researchers from the German Aerospace Center and the Universidad de Valle de Guatemala also contributed to the effort. More than a dozen students have taken part in the experiment, including four from CU Boulder. Which of these mutants survives the trip to the moon and which doesn’t could give scientists new clues about how radiation might affect human astronauts. Zea explained that yeast cells may not look much like large primates, but they share about 70% of their genes with humans. These cultures, in other words, will provide a window into how certain genes, or mechanisms for repairing damaged genes, may be critical to helping organisms survive the rigors of space. “What we may be able to do is give future space explorers drugs that enhance the efficiency of these DNA repair mechanisms,” Zea said. “It’s kind of like an antioxidant that will help moderate the effects of radiation.” I’m coming home However, before that happens, the team will need to wait — and wait. The trip to Orion is only the first leg of the experiment. Researchers want to know how space radiation affects microbes. To tease this out, BioServe will grow identical yeast cultures on the International Space Station and on the ground in Boulder. The box itself in Orion has a long journey ahead of it. Niederwiser and Zea delivered the experiment to NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in mid-August. Once Orion comes back to Earth later this fall, Colorado researchers will have to wait for a team to retrieve the capsule and its biological experiments. “It’s especially annoying because we won’t know if the unit has worked as it should until we get the box back in two or three months,” Niederwieser said. However, he and his colleagues are confident that the tiny space explorers will not let them down. Scientist sends yeast and algae into space on Artemis 1 Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder Reference: Moon-bound yeast will provide clues to how radiation affects astronauts (2022, August 30) Retrieved August 31, 2022, from
This document is subject to copyright. Except for any fair dealing for purposes of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without written permission. Content is provided for informational purposes only.

title: “Yeast Committed To The Moon Will Provide Clues About How Radiation Affects Astronauts Klmat” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-14” author: “Brenda Evans”

A team of researchers led by CU Boulder is sending some unexpected hitchhikers to the moon: Twelve bags filled with baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), the same kind of hard-working cells that make bread rise and ferment beer and wine. As early as Friday, a rocket taller than the Statue of Liberty is scheduled to blast off from a launch pad in Florida, carrying NASA’s new Orion space capsule into Earth orbit for the first time. From there, the spacecraft, designed to carry four astronauts, will begin a 42-day journey to the Moon and back to Earth. There are no humans on this mission, called Artemis 1. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be passengers. Three human mannequins, named Moonikin Campos, Helga and Zohar, will fly aboard Orion — as will four biological experiments, including one designed by a team at BioServe Space Technologies, a center in the Ann and HJ Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences. The experiment is hidden under one of the seats in a case the size of a shoebox. Inside, millions of yeast cells will help scientists answer a critical question in space exploration: How human bodies might fare in the extreme environment of deep space, where astronauts could be exposed to thousands of chest X-rays worth of radiation. every trip. “Nothing like this has happened in 50 years,” said Tobias Niederwieser, a research associate at BioServe and an engineer on the team. “The last time humans sent anything biological on a return trip to the Moon was during Apollo 17 in 1972.” But it’s also just the beginning. Artemis 1 is the first step in NASA’s new era of lunar exploration. The space agency plans to launch human astronauts, including the first woman, to the surface of the Moon later this decade. Researchers at BioServe strive to keep these lunar explorers safe. Once the yeast cultures return to Earth, the team will retrieve the cells to study their DNA—and potentially find clues that could help scientists prevent or treat the effects of radiation sickness in astronauts. Luis Zea, a former researcher at BioServe now at Colorado-based Sierra Space, is leading the project. He said it made him look at the moon in a new way. “I don’t see it the same,” Zea said. “Because I know Orion will soon be orbiting it with the hardware and science we’ve been working on for four years.” Away from home For Zea and his colleagues, this experiment, officially called Deep Space Radiation Genomics (DSRG), has been a long time coming. For nearly 35 years, BioServe researchers have helped fly hundreds of biological experiments into space. Most of them have traveled to the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits about 250 miles above Earth. Credit: NASA Orion is a different kind of laboratory. For starters, the spacecraft flies much farther—hundreds of thousands of miles farther. In the process, it will travel past Earth’s Van Allen belts, a pair of doughnut-shaped radiation belts that surround the planet and shield it from the sun’s most dangerous rays. And unlike the experiments on the ISS, there will be no astronauts to help run the DSRG. “The whole experiment is battery powered,” Niederwieser said. “We can’t get data from it. We can’t send it a signal to tell it when to start.” Instead, Niederwieser and his team designed the shoebox-sized lab to automatically detect when it’s far enough from Earth and then activate. Once this happens, small pumps will fill the yeast sacs with a nutrient-rich liquid and the cells will begin to grow and reproduce. Yeast cells themselves are an engineering marvel. Working with researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada, the BioServe team grew about 12,000 mutant strains of yeast for the experiment. Some of these organisms are missing certain genes, while others carry extra copies of these same code fragments. Researchers from the German Aerospace Center and the Universidad de Valle de Guatemala also contributed to the effort. More than a dozen students have taken part in the experiment, including four from CU Boulder. Which of these mutants survives the trip to the moon and which doesn’t could give scientists new clues about how radiation might affect human astronauts. Zea explained that yeast cells may not look much like large primates, but they share about 70% of their genes with humans. These cultures, in other words, will provide a window into how certain genes, or mechanisms for repairing damaged genes, may be critical to helping organisms survive the rigors of space. “What we may be able to do is give future space explorers drugs that enhance the efficiency of these DNA repair mechanisms,” Zea said. “It’s kind of like an antioxidant that will help moderate the effects of radiation.” I’m coming home However, before that happens, the team will need to wait — and wait. The trip to Orion is only the first leg of the experiment. Researchers want to know how space radiation affects microbes. To tease this out, BioServe will grow identical yeast cultures on the International Space Station and on the ground in Boulder. The box itself in Orion has a long journey ahead of it. Niederwiser and Zea delivered the experiment to NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in mid-August. Once Orion comes back to Earth later this fall, Colorado researchers will have to wait for a team to retrieve the capsule and its biological experiments. “It’s especially annoying because we won’t know if the unit has worked as it should until we get the box back in two or three months,” Niederwieser said. However, he and his colleagues are confident that the tiny space explorers will not let them down. Scientist sends yeast and algae into space on Artemis 1 Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder Reference: Moon-bound yeast will provide clues to how radiation affects astronauts (2022, August 30) Retrieved August 31, 2022, from
This document is subject to copyright. Except for any fair dealing for purposes of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without written permission. Content is provided for informational purposes only.

title: “Yeast Committed To The Moon Will Provide Clues About How Radiation Affects Astronauts Klmat” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-02” author: “Rachel Rodriquez”

A team of researchers led by CU Boulder is sending some unexpected hitchhikers to the moon: Twelve bags filled with baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), the same kind of hard-working cells that make bread rise and ferment beer and wine. As early as Friday, a rocket taller than the Statue of Liberty is scheduled to blast off from a launch pad in Florida, carrying NASA’s new Orion space capsule into Earth orbit for the first time. From there, the spacecraft, designed to carry four astronauts, will begin a 42-day journey to the Moon and back to Earth. There are no humans on this mission, called Artemis 1. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be passengers. Three human mannequins, named Moonikin Campos, Helga and Zohar, will fly aboard Orion — as will four biological experiments, including one designed by a team at BioServe Space Technologies, a center in the Ann and HJ Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences. The experiment is hidden under one of the seats in a case the size of a shoebox. Inside, millions of yeast cells will help scientists answer a critical question in space exploration: How human bodies might fare in the extreme environment of deep space, where astronauts could be exposed to thousands of chest X-rays worth of radiation. every trip. “Nothing like this has happened in 50 years,” said Tobias Niederwieser, a research associate at BioServe and an engineer on the team. “The last time humans sent anything biological on a return trip to the Moon was during Apollo 17 in 1972.” But it’s also just the beginning. Artemis 1 is the first step in NASA’s new era of lunar exploration. The space agency plans to launch human astronauts, including the first woman, to the surface of the Moon later this decade. Researchers at BioServe strive to keep these lunar explorers safe. Once the yeast cultures return to Earth, the team will retrieve the cells to study their DNA—and potentially find clues that could help scientists prevent or treat the effects of radiation sickness in astronauts. Luis Zea, a former researcher at BioServe now at Colorado-based Sierra Space, is leading the project. He said it made him look at the moon in a new way. “I don’t see it the same,” Zea said. “Because I know Orion will soon be orbiting it with the hardware and science we’ve been working on for four years.” Away from home For Zea and his colleagues, this experiment, officially called Deep Space Radiation Genomics (DSRG), has been a long time coming. For nearly 35 years, BioServe researchers have helped fly hundreds of biological experiments into space. Most of them have traveled to the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits about 250 miles above Earth. Credit: NASA Orion is a different kind of laboratory. For starters, the spacecraft flies much farther—hundreds of thousands of miles farther. In the process, it will travel past Earth’s Van Allen belts, a pair of doughnut-shaped radiation belts that surround the planet and shield it from the sun’s most dangerous rays. And unlike the experiments on the ISS, there will be no astronauts to help run the DSRG. “The whole experiment is battery powered,” Niederwieser said. “We can’t get data from it. We can’t send it a signal to tell it when to start.” Instead, Niederwieser and his team designed the shoebox-sized lab to automatically detect when it’s far enough from Earth and then activate. Once this happens, small pumps will fill the yeast sacs with a nutrient-rich liquid and the cells will begin to grow and reproduce. Yeast cells themselves are an engineering marvel. Working with researchers at the University of British Columbia in Canada, the BioServe team grew about 12,000 mutant strains of yeast for the experiment. Some of these organisms are missing certain genes, while others carry extra copies of these same code fragments. Researchers from the German Aerospace Center and the Universidad de Valle de Guatemala also contributed to the effort. More than a dozen students have taken part in the experiment, including four from CU Boulder. Which of these mutants survives the trip to the moon and which doesn’t could give scientists new clues about how radiation might affect human astronauts. Zea explained that yeast cells may not look much like large primates, but they share about 70% of their genes with humans. These cultures, in other words, will provide a window into how certain genes, or mechanisms for repairing damaged genes, may be critical to helping organisms survive the rigors of space. “What we may be able to do is give future space explorers drugs that enhance the efficiency of these DNA repair mechanisms,” Zea said. “It’s kind of like an antioxidant that will help moderate the effects of radiation.” I’m coming home However, before that happens, the team will need to wait — and wait. The trip to Orion is only the first leg of the experiment. Researchers want to know how space radiation affects microbes. To tease this out, BioServe will grow identical yeast cultures on the International Space Station and on the ground in Boulder. The box itself in Orion has a long journey ahead of it. Niederwiser and Zea delivered the experiment to NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in mid-August. Once Orion comes back to Earth later this fall, Colorado researchers will have to wait for a team to retrieve the capsule and its biological experiments. “It’s especially annoying because we won’t know if the unit has worked as it should until we get the box back in two or three months,” Niederwieser said. However, he and his colleagues are confident that the tiny space explorers will not let them down. Scientist sends yeast and algae into space on Artemis 1 Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder Reference: Moon-bound yeast will provide clues to how radiation affects astronauts (2022, August 30) Retrieved August 31, 2022, from
This document is subject to copyright. Except for any fair dealing for purposes of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without written permission. Content is provided for informational purposes only.