Voyager Technologies has signed a contract with the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space to manage Symphony Biosciences’ biopolymer cancer implant experiment aboard the International Space Station.
The mission will test SymphNode, a device developed by Symphony Biosciences that is designed to restore the body’s immune response under immunosuppressive conditions by recruiting and activating a patient’s T cells to fight cancer.
Voyager will provide mission management services covering the preparation, integration, operation and return of the experiment.
The company will adapt Symphony Biosciences’ sample hardware for compatibility with International Space Station equipment and support the experiment through NASA’s required safety review process.
Voyager will also manage integration and stowage ahead of launch.
Once the experiment reaches orbit, Voyager mission managers will oversee activities from the company’s mission operations room.
Those responsibilities will include supporting incubation and fluorescence readings and assisting astronauts as they conduct the experiment aboard the ISS.
At the conclusion of the study, Voyager will manage the return of the experiment’s samples and data and provide post-flight and mission close-out reporting.
The research is intended to examine whether immune cells trained using SymphNode can effectively respond to cancer under conditions created aboard the space station.
The ISS study will seek to replicate in vitro research previously conducted on Earth using human T cells and tumor cells.
Researchers are particularly interested in microgravity because tumor cells can form complex three-dimensional structures in that environment that may be more difficult to reproduce or observe using conventional Earth-based cell cultures.
That environment could provide researchers with another way to evaluate how immune cells interact with tumors and whether approaches such as SymphNode can improve the body’s immune response.
The contract also illustrates the continued use of low-Earth orbit as a research environment for biotechnology and pharmaceutical development.
Voyager has accumulated two decades of flight heritage across more than 1,400 missions.
The company said its mission management capabilities are also being positioned to support a transition from research conducted aboard the International Space Station to future commercial space platforms.
Those platforms include Starlab, the planned commercial space station being developed as part of the next generation of low-Earth orbit infrastructure.
Voyager Technologies operates across defense technology and space solutions, with capabilities spanning propulsion, energetics, advanced electronics, mission management and space exploration.
KEY QUOTES:
“Our mission management service exists to clear the obstacles between breakthrough research and low-Earth orbit. Microgravity provides a cancer research environment where tumor cells form complex, three-dimensional structures that are obscured in Earth cultures, and our role is to make sure nothing stands between companies like Symphony Biosciences and unlocking better ways to fight cancer and improve life on Earth.”
Scott Rodriguez, Vice President, Government Programs at Voyager Technologies
