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Protein Crystal Growth
Three sets of experiments in the Shuttle Orbiter middeck will explore the inner space of the human body by making crystals of proteins and other biochemicals.
While we know the chemical formulas for many proteins, we don't know the structures. It's kind of like knowing that a skyscraper takes 50 km of pipes, 2,000 km of wiring, 200,000 kg of drywall, and ... but where do you put it? Organic materials can be grown as crystals - you did it if you grew sugar crystals in school. Protein molecules weigh about 2,000 times as much as sugar molecules and are so fragile they can be impossible to grow in useful sizes on Earth. So we grow them in space in order to get near-perfect specimens so we can X-ray them and draw their blueprints. Then we can understand how they work, and design more effective drugs to treat diseases.
The equipment on MSL-1 includes triple-barrel syringes called VDA-2, special tubes with valves called HH-DTC, and samples surrounded by moats in PCAM.
