The development of spaceflight experiments withArabidopsis as a model system in gravitropism studies

Abstract

Experiments withArabidopsis have been developed for spaceflight studies in the European Space Agency's Blorack module. The Biorack is a multiuser facility that is flown on the United States Space Shuttle and serves as a small laboratory for studying cell and developmental biology in unicells, plants, and small invertebrates. The purpose of our spaceflight research was to investigate the starch-statolith model for gravity perception by studying wild-type (WT) and three starch-deficient mutants ofArabidopsis. Since spaceflight opportunities for biological experimentation are scarce, the extensive ground-based testing described in this paper is needed to ensure the success of a flight project. Therefore, the specific aims of our ground-based research were: (1) to modify the internal configuration of the flight hardware, which originally was designed for large lentil seeds, to accommodate smallArabidopsis seeds; (2) to maximize seed germination in the hardware; and (3) to develop favorable conditions in flight hardware for the growth and gravitropism of seedlings. The hardware has been modified, and growth conditions forArabidopsis have been optimized. These experiments were successfully flown on two Space Shuttle missions in 1997.