>> The Dragon Spacecraft launching soon
to the International Space Station is carrying supplies
for the crew and a number of science experiments.
Among them is new hardware for new research that's focusing
on crystallization of the cystic fibrosis protein
which could help researchers develop better drugs
to treat the disease.
Joining us now we have principal investigator Dr. Stephen Aller
of the Advancing Membrane Protein Crystallization
by using Microgravity Experiment.
So very briefly can you just describe
for us what causes cystic fibrosis
and also how it is treated?
>> Cystic fibrosis is a point mutation in the protein
in 90 percent of the patients which the protein is misfolded
and none of it gets to the cell surface
where it's required to function.
Its normal function is a chloride channel
and allows plenty of water to flow and lubricate the lungs
and without this protein called CFTR people develop very sticky
mucus lungs and that results in infection and so we're trying
to study the three dimensional structure of this protein
in order to understand how it works and how
to correct the defects.
>> So why the focus
on crystallizing the proteins for such treatment?
>> So a lot of drug screens
that companies do are basically brute force and looking
for an affect and they don't emphasize the mechanism
by which drugs work.
One of the important ways to learn by which drugs work is
to see the three dimensional shape of the targets
that the drugs bind to.
And we don't have any idea about the atomic structure
of this cystic fibrosis protein.
We have one structure of a very close relative of it
but right now we don't have any idea what the protein looks
like particularly, in the region where it is misfolded.
So if we could determine the shape
in atomic detail we can learn how
to better correct the defect much more specifically
and potently to get better drugs.
>> So can you explain to me also how is this experiment going
to be working on orbit?
>> Okay. So the general idea that we're testing is similar
to other products which are going up is that in space
when you don't have gravity we don't have any
convection forces.
These are like forces of wind which are in the fluids
and they're actually very strong forces that are banging
around on the molecules that happens here one the ground
and it makes it really challenging
for protein crystals to form.
If you put a crystallization experiment in space
with specialized hardware you remove this convection force
and it gives the protein crystals much more time
to form really, really perfect lattices
and for difficult proteins like the cystic fibrosis protein
and two other relatives
that we're studying they don't form very well ordered crystals
on the ground and we're exploring the hypothesis
that this microgravity will allow much,
much more perfect crystals to form
and give us a lot more detailed information about the proteins.
>> So growing these crystals in space is better
than on the ground and so we're going to be able
to take advantage of that microgravity environment aboard
the International Space Station to conduct this experiment.
That's very good.
Can you also tell me how long is it going to take
to grow these crystals and when do they come home?
>> Mission is scheduled to come back in July, okay.
So that's several months and we need extra time
because the process is much slower.
So up until we had the Space Shuttle program
which was limited to a very short duration,
a lot of this wasn't possible.
But because we have the resources in the space station,
it's up there for many, many months we now have capabilities
to allow experiments to go for much longer
and hopefully capture crystallization processes
which are much slower to happen.
>> Can you tell me also what will become
of these crystals during this flight once they are returned?
>> They'll be returned
in specialized hardware and recovered.
They splash down in the ocean and recovered by a special team.
They're flown in a jet that handles them very carefully
and then my group will one by one examine the crystals
that are in them and protect them
from a process called cryoprotection to protect them
from damage during freezing and then we will ship them
to the U.S. Synchrotrons for data collection
and synchrotrons are very critical for our proteins
because they offer us very high intensity x-ray beam
and much better data quality than what is possible
with a lower intensity home source.
So we will collect the data from the crystals
and in some cases compare them to earth grown crystals,
in one case where we have enough protein to do that.
And we will know with high confidence just the effects
of microgravity on these specific proteins.
>> Best of luck to you and thanks again for coming
and talking with us today.
>> Thank you, thank you. ------------------------------e9d77e82cdb1--