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Product Name: STS-90 Day 2 Highlights

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On Saturday, April 18, 1998, 6:00 a.m. CDT, STS-90 MCC Status Report # 2 reports: The STS-90 crew aboard Shuttle Columbia -- Commander Rick Searfoss, Pilot Scott Altman, Mission Specialists Rick Linnehan, Kay Hire and Dave Williams along with Payload Specialists Jay Buckey and Jim Pawelczyk - will begin their first full day of on-orbit operations when they are awakened later this morning just before 8 a.m. Central as Neurolab research activities get into full swing. The Neurolab studies of the human nervous system include a total of 26 individual experiments, involving both the crew members and crickets, fish and rodents onboard the shuttle. The experiments include studies of blood pressure, balance, coordination and sleep patterns, and they all have the potential to benefit researchers on Earth studying a variety of illnesses that can affect these functions. They also provide valuable insight into the basic operation of the nervous system, the most complex and least well-known part of the human body. In space, understanding the effects of weightlessness on astronauts is crucial to prepare for long stays. Following an on-time launch yesterday afternoon and a 'go' for on orbit operations, Linnehan, commander of the science activities on the flight, and Williams, a Canadian astronaut, entered the laboratory in the shuttle's cargo bay to begin research work. The first experiments took place shortly afterward as payload specialist Buckey began an evaluation of the effects of weightlessness on eye-hand coordination. Buckey donned a special glove and attempted to track pinpoints of light moving through different patterns in a special facility. Williams, Pawelczyk and Linnehan will also perform the evaluation. Sessions in the experiment will be repeated midway through the mission and at the end of the flight to gauge the effects of the body's adaptation to weightlessness. Hire activated the Bioreactor Demonstration Experiment, an investigation that grows cell tissue cultures in weightlessness. The device, making its fourth shuttle flight, has the capability to grow more perfect tissue samples in weightlessness than can be achieved on Earth. Cell samples in the bioreactor experiment aboard Columbia include renal tissue and bone marrow, both samples being evaluated for the ability to produce substances useful in a variety of medical treatments on Earth. Payload activities today will include Williams and Buckey setting up the General Purpose Work Station (GPWS), a facility in the Spacelab used for studying and working with rodents. They will perform dissection work on some of the rodent subjects being carried on the flight. Linnehan and Pawelczyk will conduct vestibular experiments - investigations that look at the balance mechanism -- and Altman will service the on-board refrigerator freezer used for storing biological samples. The crew also will conduct some troubleshooting with a data interface unit and a data recording system associated with the Vestibular Function Experiment Unit (VFEU). The VFEU is an aquarium unit that has four separate houses to hold the fish and snails being carried on the flight. Shortly before taking a break for launch, Hire and Pawelczyk will conduct an interview with reporters from the Florida Today and the Orlando Sentinel at 2:44 p.m. CDT this afternoon. Questions are expected to focus on Neurolab science objectives and Hire being the first KSC engineer selected as an astronaut. On Saturday, April 18, 1998, 6:00 p.m. CDT, STS-90 MCC Status Report # 3 reports: Columbia's crew members began a slate of 26 experiments focused on the human nervous system today as they moved through their first full day in orbit, measuring each other's blood pressure changes and working with some of the rodents and fish onboard for studies of the sense of balance. Payload Commander Rick Linnehan and Payload Specialist Jim Pawelczyk measured each other's blood pressure and blood flow to the brain for an investigation into how the body adapts in weightlessness, where it does not have to work against gravity to circulate blood. Astronaut Kay Hire began studies of Oyster Toadfish aboard Columbia, jostling the specially instrumented saltwater aquarium to study how the fish maintain a sense of up and down in weightlessness. For other studies of the sense of balance and the inner ear in weightlessness, Payload Specialist Jay Buckey, an associate professor of medicine at Dartmouth Medical School, dissected four of the rats housed in Columbia's laboratory facilities. The studies complement orientation investigations in which crew members are participating and should provide new insight into how the inner ears of both animals and humans adapt when first exposed to weightlessness. Called Neurolab, all of the nervous system studies can benefit researchers studying illnesses on Earth as well as provide insight into how astronauts may better counteract the effects of weightlessness for future long space journeys. The blood pressure studies may assist those on Earth researching similar blood pressure conditions that can cause dizziness or fainting, a symptom astronauts also may briefly experience upon their return to Earth. Studies of the sense of balance and its adaptation to weightlessness may provide information to assist studies of inner ear disorders on Earth. Early this afternoon, Hire and Pawelczyk took time out from the science activities to answer questions from reporters with two Kennedy Space Center, Florida, area newspapers, the NASA center where Hire was working when she was selected as an astronaut. During the evening, the crew began research activities using a rotating chair in the laboratory that stimulates the inner ear with its spinning and allows scientists to measure how vision provides cues to assist the sense of balance in space.