For Release: Nov. 8, 1995

Steve Roy
Office of Media Services
(205) 544-0034
steve.roy@msfc.nasa.gov

NOTE TO EDITORS: 95-100N

MARSHALL PROTEIN CRYSTAL GROWTH EXPERIMENTS TO BE EXCHANGED ON MIR SPACE STATION DURING STS-74

A protein crystal growth experiment, carrying several hundred protein samples, placed aboard the Mir space station during STS-71 in July, will be among the experiments retrieved and returned to Earth on STS-74 this month. The experiment is managed by the Marshall Space Flight Center’s Biotechnology Office in Huntsville, Ala.

Upon return to Earth, the protein samples, will be studied and compared to those grown on Earth and over shorter periods during previous Shuttle missions. Several hundred more experiment protein samples will be placed aboard the station and retrieved on a later flight.

STS-74 is currently scheduled to be launched Saturday, Nov. 11, at approximately 6:56 a.m. CST aboard the Shuttle Atlantis and to dock with Mir on the fourth day of the flight. Landing is is scheduled to occur at the Kennedy Space Center, Fla. on Sunday, Nov. 19, at 11:30 p.m., after a nearly 8-day flight.

During the three days of docked operations, astronauts and cosmonauts will transfer the American biomedical and microgravity science samples and data collected by the Mir 18, Mir 19 and Mir 20 crews, from the space station to the Shuttle.

The mission is the second of seven planned Space Shuttle-Mir Space Station link-ups between 1995 and 1997, including rendezvous, docking and crew transfers, which will pave the way for assembly of the International Space Station beginning in November 1997.