SCIENCE RESEARCH ON ISS RUSSIAN SEGMENT
BIOTECHNOLOGICAL EXPERIMENT "ANDROMEDA" Program "GCF" EXPERIMENT
"GCF" experiment is incorporated into
the French research program ANDROMEDA,
which is a constituent part of the "Program for
implementation of scientific and application research
planned for the third manned expedition ISS-3".
CNES is a customer for preparing and carrying out
the program of scientific and engineering experiments
during the French astronaut mission to ISS RS.
"GCF" experiment is a continuation of the studies
that began during STS-95 mission when three experiments
were performed using crystallization units APCF in order
to test crystallization technique that uses counter-diffusion
method in zero gravity. This mission will use the already
developed crystallization technique on new equipment - GCF
crystallization unit.
EQUIPMENT USED:
Thermal insulation transport container GCF 01;
GCF 02 kit to return the experiment results to Earth.
OBJECTIVE:
Protein crystallization in zero gravity to study
spatio-temporal oversaturation patterns in the course
of protein crystal nuclei formation and growth using
the technique of counter-diffusion in gel.
TASKS:
Developmental testing of crystallization process
in GCF unit based on counter-diffusion technique using
X-ray capillaries as a protein chamber.
