Blood-Clotting Research, Spacewalk Cleanup Wrap Up Week on Space Station
The Expedition 74 crew members primarily focused their science work on blood-clotting and immune function in microgravity to advance human health on Friday. Meanwhile, spacesuit maintenance continues aboard the International Space Station following a spacewalk on Wednesday.
Living in space creates a higher risk in astronauts for abnormal blood clots, infections, and overactive inflammation. Flight engineers Chris Williams and Jessica Meir of NASA, along with Sophie Adenot of ESA (European Space Agency) explored this phenomena on Friday and took turns processing blood platelet samples inside the Kibo laboratory module’s Life Science Glovebox. NASA flight engineer Jack Hathaway assisted with the research operations collecting the blood platelet samples and placing them inside the KERMIT fluorescent microscope to observe potential space-caused biological changes. Doctors are studying how microgravity alters blood platelets, cell fragments that form clots and prevent bleeding, to protect human health on and off the Earth.
The astronaut quartet still had time in their schedule for more ongoing research and maintenance activities at the end of the week. Williams worked on water transfers between NASA and Roscosmos tanks. Next, he paired up with Meir for an eye exam measuring their horizontal and vertical range of vision, including peripheral vision. Earlier, Meir photographed microgreens and alfalfa plants to document plants growing in microgravity to promote space agriculture. Adenot, tried on a prototype internal spacesuit designed by ESA engineers to be comfortable and quick fitting on a spacecraft. Hathaway swapped samples inside the Advanced Space Experiment Sample Processor-4 to study how weightlessness affects drug crystals possibly leading to new pharmaceutical formulas.
The orbital outpost’s three cosmonauts continue cleaning up after a spacewalk on Wednesday to install a solar radiation experiment and remove physics and microbiology research gear. Station commander Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and flight engineer Sergei Mikaev removed lights, batteries, and tethers from a pair of Orlan suits they wore during their spacewalk then cleaned and stowed the suits inside the Poisk module. Flight engineer Andrey Fedyaev, who maneuvered the spacewalkers with European robotic arm (ERA), finalized operations with the ERA returning it to its pre-spacewalk configuration.
Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_stationon X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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