Some advanced cancer-fighting strategies are breathing in spatial experiences
Gravity in low Earth orbit, which is 10,000 to 1 million times less efficient, those who sit on the surface of the earth, to study the function of cells, which is usually obscured by the reactions to researchers the gravity. More information on these processes to shed light on how cancer cells and bad work.
The severity of "If" to take, you can clearly some things that can not be delayed on the ground, said cell biologist Jeanne Becker. If the weight is reduced, the cells change shape, change the genes that are activated and protein.
For decades, researchers have found. Skylab, the first station in the United States, found such experiments in 1970 as red blood cells develop areas with "holes" while they are in space, a change that has gone in a matter of hours if the astronauts return to earth.
Recently, researchers have studied the behavior of genes cell 10000 1632 of Altera from assigned (including tumor cell death and gene circumcision) in zero gravity.
While the absence of gravity is able to affect the normal biology, standard methods for the examination of cells on earth to introduce their own problems. Experiments on earth, for example, often have cells that grow as flat, if Verhalten hid when they can interact with each other in three dimensions so complicated in real life.
If cancer has developed in three dimensions, the response to drugs varies widely, became the most robust, Becker said.
These findings inspired the creation of units that can mimic the effects of weightlessness on earth so that researchers can see their cells in three dimensions. For example, assumptions maintain Bioreactors, rotation cells turn all the time, as much as possible free-fall in space.
Other devices use magnetic fields to levitate the cells and counteract gravity.
These machines have supported the analysis of a number of cancers such as breast, cervical cancer, colon, liver, skin, lung, blood, kidney, ovarian and prostate.
"The work we can help, as the cancer grows-direction as well as new ways to combat drug resistance," Becker said.
While devices that try to imitate or induce lightness is valuable to science can not completely replace the effects observed in the circuit. For example, the crew of the space shuttle Columbia in 2003 found that prostate cancer cells were grown in the Converter space structures the size of a golf ball while groups of 3 to 5 mm in size reaching only bioreactors.
"With the international space station, a laboratory that existed from nothing Becker said. " It is a very interesting discovery platform. »
space science has improved microencapsulation technology, surrounded by the molecules in the form of capsules, help develops new drugs against cancer. In addition, the research examines how plants respond to light and showed new ways to reduce the pain associated with cancer treatments.
Although retired NASA space shuttle 2011, "we have access to the space station to act and vehicle access to measure the progression of the Russian ship, Becker said." If the possibilities are truly endless. "