A Good Neighborhood for Cells: Bioreactor Demonstration System (BDS-05)

Good neighborhoods help you grow. As with a city, the lives of a cell are governed by its neighborhood connections Connections that do not work are implicated in a range of diseases. One of those connections - between prostate cancer and bone cells - will be studied on STS-107 using the Bioreactor Demonstration System (BDS-05). To improve the prospects for finding novel therapies, and to identify biomarkers that predict disease progression, scientists need tissue models that behave the same as metastatic or spreading cancer. This is one of several NASA-sponsored lines of cell science research that use the microgravity environment of orbit in an attempt to grow lifelike tissue models for health research. As cells replicate, they "self associate" to form a complex matrix of collagens, proteins, fibers, and other structures. This highly evolved microenvironment tells each cell who is next door, how it should grow arid into what shapes, and how to respond to bacteria, wounds, and other stimuli. Studying these mechanisms outside the body is difficult because cells do not easily self-associate outside a natural environment. Most cell cultures produce thin, flat specimens that offer limited insight into how cells work together. Ironically, growing cell cultures in the microgravity of space produces cell assemblies that more closely resemble what is found in bodies on Earth. NASA's Bioreactor comprises a miniature life support system and a rotating vessel containing cell specimens in a nutrient medium. Orbital BDS experiments that cultured colon and prostate cancers have been highly promising.