NASA engineers have put together a spacecraft the size of a briefcase called BioSentinel, which will carry yeast into the sun's orbit to help them better understand the difference between radiation on our planet and that of other bodies.
BioSentinel is one of 13 projects planned as part of the Artemis 1 mission scheduled for mid-2020. 47 years after the last launch of living organisms (Apollo 17, which reached the Moon in December 1972).
Unlike Apollo 17, which remained in space less than two weeks, BioSentinel will collect data for 9-12 months and study the long-term effects of space radiation on DNA, as well as the ability of DNA to self-repair from damage received.
“It's uncharted territory,” says Kimberly Ennico Smith, astrophysicist at NASA's Ames Research Center. “A really important aspect of the project is that the DNA repair mechanisms implemented by yeasts are similar to those of humans”.
The small satellite weighing just 14kg will carry two different varieties of yeast: Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which has a strong resistance to radiation, and a mutated type which does not have the same capabilities of resistance.
The BioSentinel team will monitor the growth and activity of both the varieties during their stay in space, comparing them with the specimens on Earth and with those brought to the ISS in Earth orbit.
The results of BioSentinel's journey will be crucial for the development of long-term space explorations.
The stages of the space race
At the end of the assembly, e.g October 2019, the phase will begin of integration of the satellite in the SLS launch system, the mega rocket that will fly for the first time in the Artemis 1 mission: SLS will be used to transport people and materials to destinations such as the Moon and Mars combined with the Orion capsule.
In 2020, Artemis 1 mission, the SLS rocket will launch Orion towards a test around to lunar orbit: if successful, the next mission, Artemis 2, will take 4 astronauts around the Moon in 2023.
In 2022, a year earlier, the launch of the small Space Station orbiting the Moon will take place: this outpost, which NASA evocatively calls "The Gate", will then launch all future space missions scouting on lunar soil.
