April 16 Shuttle Launch to Include UT-Houston Medical School Research

While we've grown a bit accustomed to the routine launches of NASA's Space Shuttle, the April 16 mission of the Shuttle will be of special interest since UT-Houston Medical School research will be onboard.

"That launch of the Shuttle will be dedicated to the Decade of the Brain and will be carrying 26 research projects aboard focused on brain research," says Dr. Jim Knierim, an assistant professor in the department of neurobiology and anatomy and one of the selected researchers to have a project in space.

Dr. Knierim is working on higher brain function involving cognitive systems and how we orient spatially to our everyday environment. He and his colleagues, Drs. Bruce McNaughton and Gina Poe at the University of Arizona, started working with NASA three-and-a-half years ago to develop their research protocol which includes four rats and some very sophisticated equipment.

Explains Dr. Knierim, the business of spatial memory is not as simple as seeing a landmark and knowing where you are at any given moment. Every time you tilt your head or move, a complex system of neurons in the hippocampus of your brain receives data from lower parts of the brain and begins to interact. Using rat models, Dr. Knierim's colleagues at the University of Arizona have developed ways to visually map the firing of 100 neurons at a time to get a better picture of this complex symphony of interactions. To make it even more complicated, neurons that don't fire appear to be as much a part of the memory system as those that do fire. Disentangling the influence of visual cues, motion, gravity, and other sensory and environmental inputs is all part of the science and the mystery.

The weightless atmosphere of space along with Dr. Knierim's ability to record populations of neuron firings will allow him to gather important data on rats as they navigate a creative 270 degree maze that differs by a quarter turn from the typical 360 degrees of a full circle. That weightless difference of 90 degrees may very well reveal critical clues about the spatial map within the brain. He and other participating researchers will be in Florida prior to the launch to finalize preparations for the Shuttle flight.

- BRYANT BOUTWELL, Dr.P.H.

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©2006 Texas Medical Center

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