Space shuttle Columbia’s astronauts conducted the most complex animal dissections ever done in orbit Saturday, removing the brains of four rats so scientists can see how the nervous system changes in weightlessness. The only other time animals were dissected on a space shuttle was in 1993.
By the end of Columbia’s two-week Neurolab mission, 47 rodents are to be dissected; 170 mice and rats were carried into orbit Friday.
Most of the 152 rats launched on Columbia will be killed and dissected once they’re back on Earth, as will all of the 135 snails and 229 swordtail fish. Also flying on Neurolab, the most in-depth neurological research mission to date, are four oyster toadfish and 1,514 crickets, some of them also destined for postlanding dissection.
