CCM is a privately owned research and development company, specialized in the innovative development of products and production systems for industry. Since 1982 CCM is also involved in space projects , mainly in the development and production of hardware for biological microgravity experiments. The CCM plungerbox unit is a modular experiment equipment, that can be adapted to the specific requirements of the scientists. Also the mission requirements, such as size and weight limitations, available power and the number of levels of containment are different for each flight. It is the challenge for CCM to provide the optimal hardware configuration, for each space mission, aiming at a maximum scientifc result. Each experiment hardware consists of up to three liquid storage containers, that are connected to a single culture chamber. The culture chamber and the storage containers each have a volume of 1cm3. The shape of the culture chamber can be adapted to the requirements of the experiment. The materials of the experiment hardware must comply to the space materials regulations. Also, materials must be biocompatible and able to resist repeated sterilization by autoclaving. PSU is the main material for the base block as it has a good biocompatibility, is slightly transparent and can be repeatedly autoclaved. For the Soyuz missions, CCM adapted the standard experiment units, in order to fulfill the scientific requirements of the scientists, and developed specific hardware to make it compatible with the available facility. The hardware was provided in different configurations: TMA-1 'ODISSEA': battery powered, autonomous system with experiment units for three biological experiments, each in their own experiment container; TMA-4 'DELTA': experiment units and control electronics for four biological experiments in KUBIK, different hardware configurations and control systems, adapted to the specific requirements for each experiment and TMA-8 mission: reflight of the TUBUL experiment of the DELTA mission.
Hardware for biological microgravity experiments in Soyuz missions
Hardware für Experimente zur Mikrogravität im Rahmen der Sojus-Mission
Microgravity Science and Technology ; 19 , 5/6 ; 75-79
2007
5 Seiten, 5 Bilder, 2 Tabellen, 13 Quellen
Aufsatz (Zeitschrift)
Englisch
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