Life in spaceflight demonstrates remarkable adaptive processes within the specialized environments of space vehicles which are subject to the myriad of attending and unique environmental issues associated with orbital trajectories. To examine the adaptive processes that occur in plants in space leaves and roots from Arabidopsis seedlings that were grown from seed for 12 days on the International Space Station and preserved on orbit in RNAlater were returned to earth and analyzed using iTRAQ broad scale proteomics procedures.

Understanding the molecular mechanisms by which plants sense and adapt to changes in the space environment is essential for generating plants that are better adapted to withstand space flight microgravity and other adverse conditions encountered in space. The objective of our spaceflight experiment x93Plant Signaling in Microgravity x94 (carried out on the International Space Station ISS) was to compare transcript profiles of wild type and transgenic InsP 5-ptase plants with compromised InsP3 signaling. The transgenic Arabidopsis plants constitutively express the mammalian type I inositol polyphosphate 5-phosphatase (InsP 5-ptase) an enzyme that specifically hydrolyzes the lipid-derived second messenger inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate (InsP3). These transgenic plants exhibit normal growth and morphology; however their responses to environmental stimuli including gravity and drought are altered. Seedlings were grown for 5 days under continuous light in experimental containers placed in the European Modular Cultivation system (EMCS) onboard the ISS. The EMCS consists of two rotors within a controlled chamber allowing for a x931g x94 control in space. After sample retrieval from the ISS RNA was isolated from shoot and root tissue and subjected to RNA sequencing. Two-way comparisons of micro g versus x931 x94g have uncovered regulatory mechanisms that are both conserved and altered between the wild type and transgenic seedlings.

['Plants are primary producers of food and oxygen on Earth and will likewise be indispensable to the establishment of large-scale sustainable ecosystems and human survival in space. To contribute to the understanding of how plants respond to spaceflight stresses, we examined the relevance of the unfolded protein response (UPR), a conserved signaling cascade that responds to a number of unfavorable environmental stresses, in the model plant species Arabidopsis thaliana. To do so, we compared the transcriptional responses of wild type and UPR-defective seedlings to spaceflight during the SpaceX-CRS12 mission to the International Space Station. We established that orbital culture substantially altered the expression of hundreds of stress related genes compared to ground control conditions. Although many of these genes were differentially regulated in the UPR mutants in the ground control conditions compared to wild type, their expression was largely equalized in all genotypes by flight. Our results have yielded new information on how plants respond to growth in orbit and support the hypothesis that spaceflight induces the activation of signaling pathways that compensate for the loss of UPR regulators in the control of downstream transcriptional regulatory networks.']

In prospective human exploration of outer space the need to maintain a species over several generations under changed gravity conditions may arise. This paper reports the analysis of the third generation of fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster obtained during the 44.5-day space flight (Foton-M4 satellite 2014 Russia) followed by the fourth generation on Earth and the fifth generation under conditions of a 12-day space flight (2014 in the Russian Segment of the ISS). The obtained results show that it is possible to obtain the third-fifth generations of a complex multicellular Earth organism under changed gravity conditions (in the cycle weightlessness - Earth - weightlessness) which preserves fertility and normal development. However there were a number of changes in the expression levels and content of cytoskeletal proteins that are the key components of the spindle apparatus and the contractile ring of cells.

To understand how humans adapt to space environments many experiments can be conducted on astronauts while they work aboard the Space Shuttle or the International Space Station (ISS). We also need animal experiments that can apply to human models and help prevent or solve the physical issues we face in space travel. The medaka is a suitable model fish for studying space adaptation because in the second International Microgravity Laboratory mission in 1994 adult fish mated successfully in space during 15 days of flight. In 2012 another space experiment Medaka Osteoclast was performed. Male and female fish (6 weeks old at launching) were maintained in the Aquatic Habitat system for 2 months in the ISS. The RNA-seq analysis of tissues from these fish will revealed tissue-specific responsiveness and common stress responses during space adaptation.

Spaceflight is a unique environment with profound effects on biological systems including tissue redistribution and musculoskeletal stresses. However the more subtle biological effects of spaceflight on cells and organisms are difficult to measure in a systematic unbiased manner. Here we test the utility of the molecularly barcoded yeast deletion collection to provide a quantitative assessment of the effects of microgravity on a model organism. We developed robust hardware to screen in parallel the complete collection of ~4800 homozygous and ~5900 heterozygous (including ~1100 single-copy deletions of essential genes) yeast deletion strains each carrying unique DNA that acts as strain identifiers. We compared strain fitness for the homozygous and heterozygous yeast deletion collections grown in spaceflight and ground as well as plus and minus hyperosmolar sodium chloride providing a second additive stressor. The genome-wide sensitivity profiles obtained from these treatments were then queried for their similarity to a compendium of drugs whose effects on the yeast collection have been previously reported. We found that the effects of spaceflight have high concordance with the effects of DNA-damaging agents and changes in redox state suggesting mechanisms by which spaceflight may negatively affect cell fitness.

Spaceflight is a unique environment with profound effects on biological systems including tissue redistribution and musculoskeletal stresses. However the more subtle biological effects of spaceflight on cells and organisms are difficult to measure in a systematic unbiased manner. Here we test the utility of the molecularly barcoded yeast deletion collection to provide a quantitative assessment of the effects of microgravity on a model organism. We developed robust hardware to screen in parallel the complete collection of ~4800 homozygous and ~5900 heterozygous (including ~1100 single-copy deletions of essential genes) yeast deletion strains each carrying unique DNA that acts as strain identifiers. We compared strain fitness for the homozygous and heterozygous yeast deletion collections grown in spaceflight and ground as well as plus and minus hyperosmolar sodium chloride providing a second additive stressor. The genome-wide sensitivity profiles obtained from these treatments were then queried for their similarity to a compendium of drugs whose effects on the yeast collection have been previously reported. We found that the effects of spaceflight have high concordance with the effects of DNA-damaging agents and changes in redox state suggesting mechanisms by which spaceflight may negatively affect cell fitness.

Arabidopsis thaliana was evaluated for its response to the spaceflight environment in three replicated experiments on the International Space Station. Two approaches were used; GFP reporter genes were used to collect gene expression data in real time within unique GFP imaging hardware and plants were harvested on orbit to RNAlater for subsequent analyses of gene expression with using Affymetrix and SAGE transcriptome analyses. Three tissue types were examined (leaves hypocotyls and roots) and compared to analyses conducted with whole plants. Transcriptome analyses with whole plants suggested that the spaceflight environment had little impact on the transcriptome of arabidopsis however closer examination of selected tissues revealed that there are a number of tissue-specific responses that arabidopsis employs to respond to this novel environment

Harsh environmental conditions including microgravity and radiation during prolonged spaceflights are known to alter hepatic metabolism. Our studies have focused on the analysis of possible changes in metabolic pathways in livers of mice which experienced 30 days of spaceflight with and without an additional re-adaption period of 7 days compared to control mice on Earth. Utilizing shotgun mass spectrometry and label-free quantification we performed proteomic profiling to investigate mice livers from the spaceflight project xe2 x80 x9cBion-M 1 xe2 x80 x9d. No significant alterations in protein levels were observed between control mice liver and spaceflight mice which is possibly caused by insufficient fold change detection combined with high variances within the groups. In contrast our results show that more than a third of the quantified protein levels are altered comparing the liver proteome of mice with and without re-adaption time after their spaceflight. Proteins related to amino acid metabolism showed higher levels after re-adaption which may indicate higher rates of gluconeogenesis. Members of the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor pathway reconstitute their level after 7 days due to a decrease in fold change which indicates decreased signs of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. Moreover bile acid secretion regenerates on Earth due to reconstitution of related transmembrane proteins and elevated levels of the drug-metabolising enzymes belonging to the CYP superfamily decrease 7 days after the spaceflight. Thus our study demonstrates reconstitution of pharmacological response and early signs of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease recover within 7 days whereas glucose uptake should be monitored due to alterations in gluconeogenesis.

Larvae-Pupae transition flies (Drosophila) were recovered and transport for 3 days at 12-14C to arrest development until the launch site then exposed to RT (18-20C) for some hours including the launch and trip to the International Space Station then pupae were exposed to microgravity in the ISS for 4 days and a half at 22C. Finally pupae were fixed on acetone and frozen until recovery on Earth. Four groups of samples: 1 ISS (+ground control) as described 2 RPM (microgravity simulator on Earth) as described 3 RPM without constrains (No MAMBA container and only 5 days exposure without cold transport) and 4 centrifuge 10g without constrains control.