Any Trekkies out there? Remember the tricorder? Dr. McCoy and Mr. Spock both carried them, and they came in mighty handy exploring "strange new worlds ...where no one has gone before." On the International Space Station, astronauts are carrying an experimental device that looks strikingly similar: LOCAD-PTS, short for Lab-On-a-Chip Application Development Portable Test System. This handheld biological lab is the first step along the path to developing something akin to Dr. McCoy's medical tricorder.
"What a huge relief. The whole technical team was delighted that it worked so well" - Norman Wainwright of the Charles River Laboratories in Charleston, SC.
He's talking about a miniature biological laboratory just tested for the first time onboard the International Space Station. Called LOCAD-PTS (short for Lab-On-a-Chip Application DevelopmentPortable Test System), the mini-lab detects the presence of bacteria or fungi on the surfaces of a spacecraft far more rapidly than standard methods of culturing.