Astronaut Mary Ellen Weber with BDS

STS070-301-025 (13-22 July 1995) --- Astronaut Mary Ellen Weber works with a syringe related to the Bioreactor Development System (BDS). The almost weightless state of space travel provides life science researchers with the opportunity to grow cells into three-dimensional tissue pieces that are not achievable using conventional tissue culture methods on Earth. At specified times during the STS-70 mission, crew members injected color producing substances to document fluid movement in the reactor, and various-sized beads to estimate the tissue size that could be supported in the Bioreactor. The photo was among NASA's first release of still photography from the STS-70 mission. The mission was launched from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) on July 13, 1995, and ended when Discovery landed on Runway 33 there on July 22, 1995. The crew members were astronauts Terence T. (Tom) Henricks, commander; Kevin R. Kregel, pilot; and Donald A. Thomas, Nancy J. Currie and Weber, all mission specialists.