Adams A (1999) Worm Breeder's Gazette "Philadelphia's Northeast High School Worm Project experiment on the space shuttle Discovery"

Adams A

[Worm Breeder's Gazette, 1999]

We recently had a chance to do something only a handful of people have ever done: send an experiment up into space. We sent up an 'experimental' group of dauer larvae on the space shuttle Discovery's ten-day mission. ITA of Exton, PA, granted us a very small space on the shuttle. So we decided on the relatively small C. elegans. We figured since John Glenn was going up into space to see the effects on him, we'd do a similar study. We wanted to see if the conditions of space had any effect on the C. elegans normal 18-24 day life span. With every science experiment there is a control group and an experimental group. The control group of about 1000 worms stayed in Philadelphia at Northeast High School the other 1000 worms were blasted off into orbit October 29, 1998.