SPACE PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT EXPERIMENTS

Commercial Protein Crystal Growth

Description: Proteins are the building blocks of our bodies, and the living world around us. Within our bodies, proteins make it possible for red blood cells to carry oxygen throughout the body, while others help transmit nerve impulses so we can hear, smell, and feel the world around us, while still others play a crucial role in preventing or causing disease.

If the structure of a protein is known, then companies can develop new or improved drugs to fight disease of which the protein is a part.

Description: To determine the structure, researchers must grow near-perfect crystals of the protein being studied. On Earth, convection currents, sedimentation, and other gravity-induced phenomena hamper crytal growth efforts. In microgravity, researchers can grow near-perfect crystals in an environment free of these effects. Because of the enormous potential for new pharmaceutical products, the Center for Macromolecular Crystallography -- the NASA Commercial Space Center responsible for commercial protein crystal growth efforts -- has more than 50 major industry and academic partners.

The goal of the Commercial Protein Crystal Growth payload on STS-95 is to grow large, near-perfect crystals of several different proteins of interest to industry, and to continue to refine the technology and procedures used in microgravity for this important commercial research.

The Protein Crystallization Facility will be used to grow crystals of human insulin. Lack of insulin is the primary cause of diabetes, a life-threatening disease. Previous microgravity research with industry partner Eli Lilly and the Hauptman Woodward Medical Reseach Institute in Buffalo, N.Y., has yielded crystals that far surpass the quality of insulin crystals grown on the ground. The investigations on STS-95 are aimed at producing crystals of even higher quality, which when combined with new analysis techniques will permit a better understanding of the interaction between insulin and its receptor. This has the potential to aid in the development of improved insulin with unique time release properties that could reduce fluctuations in a patient's blood sugar level.

Chagas' Disease: NASA and Brazil are partnering on two protein crystal growth experiments to better understand this deadly disease--affecting 20 million people in Latin America and the world, including the U.S. There is no vaccine for this debilitating killer. On STS-95, space researchers will grow two types of crystals (Trypanothione and Glycosomal Glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase). Researchers hope to be able to develop a drug that can effectively defeat Chagas' disease.