Science Requirements for Space Station Laboratory

The Space Station will provide a new and enhanced capability for life sciences research in space by supplying large amounts of power, volume, and crew time. It will also provide a challenge to the medical community to assure the health and well-being of crewmembers on the station and to extrapolate to longer duration missions in the future. It will be necessary to fly different species of animals on the station in order to do the types and duration of experiments necessary to understand the basic physiological mechanisms of adaptation to micro-gravity.

To do these experiments, a well-equipped animal and human laboratory must be provided. This should include imaging devices, stimulating and recording equipment and on-board analysis facilities. In addition, a large, variable-g (up to 1 g) centrifuge will be required to hold control animals, test the animal and human adaptation to space and their ability to readapt to 1-g and possibly evaluate countermeasures to space adaption.