Student Insect Experiment Arrived On Atlantis
As of Monday, four painted lady butterflies are living aboard
the International Space Station.
These "butterflynauts" are part of an educational experiment
that was launched November 16 on space shuttle Atlantis and
transferred to the Space Station. Students of all ages have been
following the tiny crew's development from larvae to
butterflies.
"All four larvae formed chrysalises and two emerged as
butterflies on November 30. Two more butterflies emerged
overnight," said Stefanie Countryman, BioServe Space Technologies
payload mission manager. The experiment is flying in BioServe's
Commercial Generic Bioprocessing Apparatus, a suitcase-sized
payload used to conduct space experiments.
In classrooms across the U.S., students have set up habitats and
are replicating the space experiment. Their objective is to compare
the growth and behavior of ground-based butterfly larvae and adult
butterflies with those living in the microgravity environment of
space.
BioServe is releasing video of the space butterflies as it
becomes available. The first video from Nov. 30 shows only one of
the butterflies. Video will be posted to YouTube and BioEd Online.
Photos of the butterflies are also available on BioEd Online.
"The larvae didn't seem to have problems navigating and feeding
in the space environment. Now, the opportunities to investigate
microgravity's effect on adult butterfly behavior, wing development
and flight are beginning," said Dr. Nancy Moreno, professor of
allied health sciences and senior associate director of Baylor
College of Medicine's (BCM) Center for Educational Outreach.
The ground-based portion of this activity is sponsored by the
National Space Biomedical Research Institute and involves the
cooperative effort of several science and education organizations.
Project partners include BioServe Space Technologies of University
of Colorado at Boulder, BCM, Orion's Quest, The Butterfly Pavilion,
Challenger Learning Center of Colorado and NASA. Additional support
is provided by the Houston Endowment Inc., and Howard Hughes
Medical Institute.
"The photos and video are being archived, so classrooms can
participate in the experiment at any time and compare their
classroom larvae with photos of space larvae at the same
developmental stage," Moreno said.
Through the educational activity, students learn the skill of
scientific observation by making detailed sketches of the larvae as
they develop. The open-ended experiment also teaches students to
ask scientific questions, observe details and differences, and use
evidence to support their own conclusions.
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