NASA’s GeneLab project is maximizing the science output from spaceflight experiments conducted aboard the International Space Station (ISS) by: (1) developing a unique public bioinformatics database that includes space bioscience relevant “omics” data (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics) and experimental metadata; (2) partnering with NASA-funded flight experiments through bio-sample sharing or sample augmentation to expedite omics data input to the GeneLab database; and (3) developing community-driven reference flight experiments.
The data hosted in the GeneLab data system to date represents omics data from numerous model organisms including microbes, yeast, C. elegans, Drosophila, Arabadopsis, rodents and human cell lines. In this presentation we will show an overview of omics data in the context of existing physiological data from spaceflight.
In 2015 GeneLab partnered with two Biological Research in Canisters experiments (BRIC-19 and BRIC-20), which examined the proteomic and transcriptomic responses of Arabidopsis thaliana to spaceflight. GeneLab also partnered with Rodent Research-1 (RR-1), the maiden flight to test the recently developed rodent habitat, and is generating transcriptomic, proteomic and epigenomic data from various tissues including liver, muscle, eye, kidney etc. GeneLab is establishing partnerships with other planned flights for 2016 including a comparative study of two bacterial species. GeneLab is also establishing sample sharing collaborations with multiple future rodent missions.
Overall, GeneLab will facilitate the generation and query of parallel multi-omics data, and deep curation of metadata for integrative analysis, allowing researchers to uncover cellular networks as observed in systems biology platforms. Consequently, the scientific community will have access to a more complete picture of functional and regulatory networks responsive to the spaceflight environment. Analysis of GeneLab data will contribute fundamental knowledge of how the space environment affects biological systems, and enable emerging terrestrial benefits resulting from mitigation strategies to prevent effects observed during exposure to space. As a result, open access to the data will foster new hypothesis-driven research for future spaceflight studies spanning basic science to translational science.
GeneLab is funded through NASA’s Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Applications Division (SLPSRA) and the International Space Station Research Integration Office (ISSRIO).