Brian Dunbar
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                                             March 6, 1992
(Phone:  202/453-1547)

Kari Fluegel
Johnson Space Center, Houston
(Phone:  713/483-5111)


RELEASE:  92-33

BIOREACTOR TEAM EARNS NASA INVENTOR OF THE YEAR HONORS

	Not many would expect an agency known for Space Shuttle launches 
and Moon expeditions to make extraordinary contributions to medical 
research, but a biotechnology team in the Medical Sciences Division at 
NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) has done so, earning the honor of NASA 
Inventor of the Year.

	JSC's David Wolf, Ray Schwarz and Tinh Trinh recently were selected 
by NASA's General Counsel Office for their development and design of a new 
class of horizontally rotating tissue culture systems -- also known as the 
rotating wall bioreactor -- that in some ways simulate microgravity.  

	Bioreactors are cell maintenance devices used for research in growth 
and culturing cells or tissues.  Investigators around the country already have 
evaluated the JSC bioreactor as a tool for pioneering research in lung tissue, 
skin growth, intestinal disease, cartilage growth, colon cancer, brain tumor 
growth and therapeutics.  "This is a good example of when NASA research 
benefits man on Earth," Wolf said.  

	The bioreactor cultures the cells in a horizontal cylinder that slowly 
rotates, resulting in lower stress environments than most devices.  It is 
believed that in space the rotating wall vessel would offer even lower shears 
which might provide more spectacular results.  

	Prior to the development of JSC's bioreactor, three-dimensional tissue 
growth could not be accomplished.  Traditional culture devices allow only 
two-dimensional growth because cells become damaged by the suspension 
vessel or do not bond together to organize themselves into actual tissues.  

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	Research with the rotating wall vessel over the past 2 years has 
enabled development of cell cultures that behave more like three-
dimensional tissues behave in the human body.  For this to be true, it is 
necessary that cells recreate the correct three-dimensional relationships in 
the bioreactor as they do in the parent tissue.  

	Wolf, Schwarz and Trinh started work on the rotating wall bioreactor 
in 1986 while the Shuttle fleet was grounded.  Tissue researchers, then 
unable to have access to space, needed a means to simulate microgravity on 
Earth, and a pooling of knowledge in biology with gravitational physics, fluid 
dynamics, rotational systems and life support systems was the answer to the 
question, Wolf said.  

	It was known that plants developed similarly when exposed to either 
horizontal rotation or actual microgravity.  Coincidentally, Trinh tried 
rotating a syringe with microcarrier beads in an electric drill.  The drill's 
spinning action suspended the beads in controlled positions, reducing 
greatly the stresses experienced by the cells.  

	The team found that just moving the medium inside the vessel was not 
enough.  The boundary layer of the medium next to a non-rotating wall 
added enough sheer stress to damage the culture.  "Rotating the wall takes 
away the fluid velocity gradients near the vessel walls," Wolf said.  "That's the 
big difference.  That's why it works."  The bioreactor also needed to 
compensate for the orientation changes experienced by a Shuttle middeck 
locker during ascent, orbit and entry.  

	Eventually several classes of vessels -- some batch and some with 
continuous media profusion -- were constructed including key components 
of a future Space Bioreactor.  

	"The Space and Life Sciences Directorate Medical Sciences Division's 
Biomedical Research and Operations Branch was an ideal place to conduct 
research.  They provided all the support necessary to make it happen," Wolf 
said.  "A mix of expertise was required including biology, mechanics and 
computers to implement the novel culture system concepts.  A space center 
provides such multidisciplinary talent.  That exactly describes the talented 
biotechnology team at JSC."  

	Wolf said that the outstanding results seen in the Earth-based research 
is predicted to be enhanced by "orders of magnitude" when the Space 
Bioreactor vessel is operated in microgravity.  Wolf, now an astronaut 
scheduled to fly on STS-58 next year, was the manager of the Biotechnology 
Laboratory when the bioreactor was developed.  Trinh is a technician with 
Krug International, and Schwarz is Chief Engineer of Synthecon Inc., the 
company with the exclusive license to the bioreactor technology.  
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	This year's honor wil be shared with William G. Simpson, Max H. 
Sharpe and William E. Hill of Marshall Space Flight Center for "Sprayable 
Lightweight Ablative Coating," used on the solid rocket boosters for layering 
not possible with the previously used material.  

	Both teams will be honored at NASA Headquarters this month.  Wolf, 
Schwarz and Trinh also are the agency's nominees for the National Inventor 
of the Year competition conducted by the National Intellectual Property 
Owners Association and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.  

	"I was thrilled not just for the team but that NASA recognized the 
technology as important and relevant to further space research," Wolf said.  
The bioreactor work was sponsored by the Office of Space Science and 
Applications Microgravity Science and Applications Division. 

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