Research activities are in full swing on the International Space Station, with a science officer aboard in every resident crew. NASA has a site dedicated to Space Station Science and from that site you can view an interactive display of science on the Space Station. Our PuFF (Pulmonary Function in Flight) experiment is featured in the Increment 3 research section!

Our experiment's flight activities are now complete with the Expedition Three through Six crews. We are studying the effects of long-duration exposure to microgravity on the lung. The effect of spacewalks on the lung, caused by the reduced pressure of the Extra-Vehicular Activity (EVA) suits, is also being investigated.

The PuFF experiment is part of the Human Research Facility, a laboratory module which contains hardware available for researchers to study the effects of microgravity on the human body. HRF Rack 1 was launched in March of 2001 in the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module, and placed in the US Laboratory.

In the beginning of September, 2001, the Expedition 3 crew performed the PuFF experiment for the first time on the ISS. Station Commander, Frank Culbertson, and Flight Engineers, Vladimir Dezhurov and Mikhail Tyurin, all participated in the PuFF experiment with data collection going very smoothly. Post-flight data collection is also now complete for the Expedition 3 crew and preliminary data are quite interesting.

Expedition 4 crew members, Flight Engineers, Dan Bursch and Carl Walz, have completed PuFF experiments on the ground during our post-flight data collection phase.

The Expedition 5 crew, Station Commander, Valery Korzun, and Flight Engineer and the first ever ISS Science Officer, Peggy Whitson, have completed the PuFF experiment post-flight baseline data collection. Data from the Expedition 5 pre-flight, in-flight and post-flight periods is being pooled with that from Expeditions 3 and 4 to increase the statistical power of the PuFF experiments and their ability to detect changes in lung physiology associated with long duration exposure to microgravity and repeated EVA's.

The Expedition 6 crew are now back on the ground after 161 days aboard the International Space Station. Station Commander Ken Bowersox and Flight Engineer and Science Officer, Don Petit, and Flight Engineer, Nikolai Budarin, participated in post-flight data collection at Star City, Russia and will continue with final post-flight sessions at JSC.

Please check back here from time to time for updates on our involvement in the ISS program.