Healthy Living

Parkinson's Disease: The Search for a Cure in Space

The micolytic crystal former optimization chip

This is the protein crystal growth hardware that was made especially for the LRRK2 protein crystal samples. This type of hardware is similar to the commercially available hardware that has flown there before. It was launched frozen, and then it was transferred to ambient temperature on the ISS laboratory to enable the nucleation and crystallization process to start. After growing for 21 days, it was transferred to a refrigerated storage to be returned to Earth for analysis.