Deploying a National Clinical Text Processing Infrastructure

Dr. Huang’s work explores how microgravity can be used as a powerful model to study impaired muscle regeneration, a process that also occurs with aging and disease. In her 2024 Stem Cell Reports publication, her team developed an innovative skeletal muscle-on-a-chip platform deployed to the International Space Station, [Read more…] demonstrating that even short-term exposure to microgravity reproduces key features of reduced muscle regenerative capacity. This system provides a unique, human-relevant platform to investigate the biological mechanisms underlying muscle decline in a controlled and accelerated setting.

As highlighted in the accompanying podcast, space offers a rare opportunity to study muscle degeneration on a compressed timescale, enabling faster insights into processes that typically unfold over years. Importantly, the platform also enables drug screening directly in microgravity, demonstrating the feasibility of testing interventions to counteract these effects. Together, this work establishes a novel translational approach that leverages space-based research to advance therapeutic discovery for muscle loss, with implications for both aging populations on Earth and human health during space travel.

Publication: Kim S, Ayan B, Shayan M, Rando TA, Huang NF. Skeletal Muscle-On-A-Chip in Microgravity As a Platform for Regeneration Modeling and Drug Screening. Stem Cell Reports 19:1061-1073 2024. doi: 10.1016/j.stemcr.2024.06.010. 

Podcast on this publication: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/stem-cells-in-space-muscle-regeneration-in-microgravity/id1561269675?i=1000716364004