Human blood cells at microgravity: the NASA Initial Blood Storage Experiment

The Initial Blood Storage Experiment (IBSE) probed the behavior of human red cells, white cells, and platelets during exposure to microgravity for 6 days and 2 hours on a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) shuttle mission, named STS 61-C, which was launched on January 12, 1986. IBSE involved carefully controlled comparisons between two identical sets of blood cells, one exposed to microgravity and the other held on the ground. Specially designed and fabricated, electrically powered environmental chambers provided appropriate environmental temperatures and air flow to support cell metabolism throughout the experiment. To circumvent the need for constant agitation of platelets during storage, a new thin-layer compression method for platelet preservation was developed. Blood cell samples were allocated to the two arms of the experiment, microgravity and earth gravity, by blind assignment. Moreover, to ensure unbiased assessment of the experiment's findings, postexperiment samples for measurement were identified by code. To optimize the chances of detecting possible gravitational effects, a wide array of measurements of cellular function, morphology, metabolism, and immunology were made. Analysis of variance was used in analyzing the data. The most striking finding was that platelets displayed markedly superior structural and functional integrity at microgravity. Granulocytes held on the ground were preserved slightly better than those that orbited in the shuttle, whereas red cells displayed few effects that were attributable to the gravitational variable. Polyvinylchloride-di-(2-ethylhexyl)phthalate (PVC-DEHP) was the plastic of choice for storage of red cells, while PVC-trioctyltrimellitate (TOTM) was superior to PVC-DEHP and polyolefin (PO) for platelets.