CRANN carries out research in zero gravity conditions

CRANN is the first Irish based research centre to be included on a zero-gravity flight conducted by the European Space Agency (ESA) this week.

Each year, the ESA invites a small number of international scientists to take part in once-off zero gravity, or parabolic flights. The prestigious invitation has allowed Dr. Despina Bazou of CRANN to conduct experiments on particles in order to quantify the forces between them and check how large aggregates she can levitate in microgravity. Bazou’s work is in the field of nanobiology; looking at how cells react to one another, specifically at the interaction and adhesion properties between cancer cells and platelets. The particles she is using in “space” are easy to use, safe and have dimensions similar to mammalian cells. In the future, she would like to form 3-D cancer aggregates that would resemble a tumour and study the interactions between them.

The ESA carries out three microgravity flights a year, one being solely for students and the other two for researchers. Microgravity, a condition when there is very little gravitational force, only occurs for around 20 seconds and allowing the scientist 12 minutes of weightlessness over the day.  Dr. Bazou is conducting experiments over three days this week in the area of nanobiology.

Diarmuid O’Brien of CRANN said, ’We are delighted that CRANN was selected for this very prestigious research opportunity.   CRANN’s place on the flight is recognition of Ireland’s growing expertise in Nanoscience.  The research which will be conducted by Dr. Bazou will help us to explore the area of nanobiology further and will hopefully lead us to a better understanding of cellular interactions.”

Dr Despina Bazou said, “I am very excited by this opportunity which came about when I was presenting at the International Congress on Ultrasonics 2009 in Chile.   I hope that the unique conditions presented by the parabolic flight will help me further my research.”

Earlier in the year, data compiled by Thomson Reuters showed that Ireland was one of the top ranked countries in the world for the quality of its nanoscience research. The results ranked Ireland 8thin the world, well ahead of larger countries such as France, Canada and Australia. The data also revealed that many of Ireland’s top-ranked research papers were produced by CRANN.

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