December 6, 2020 – Cape Canaveral, Florida – Bioasteroid, the first Bioreactor Express payload, has been successfully launched on the CRS-21 from the Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A at 11:17 AM ET and it is now on its way to the ISS.
The experiment, conceived by Prof. Charles Cockell of the University of Edinburgh, investigates how gravity affects the interaction between microbes and rock in a liquid medium. This first payload demonstrated the fast-track access to microgravity allowed by the Bioreactor Express service (contract to launch within one year).