Experiment of Fractioning Animal Cell Culturing Solution in High Concentration under Microgravity

Culturing cells and electrophoretic separations of the multiplied cell culturing solution were carried out in Space. Simultaneously the ground control test concerning cell culture was also executed. The cell secretes an antibody "IgG", which is expected as a medicine for cancer treatment and diagnosis. Production process of the IgG consists of the cell culturing process, and the IgG separation process. Though the former had been enabled by the technological development to handle a larger volume, the latter remained behind the former, and became the bottleneck of the process. In order to solve the problem, space electrophoretic separation is expected and partly verified to increase the handling volume remarkably with much higher resolution due to absence of thermal convection. In the experiments on orbit, the cells were cultured for five days from the launch, subsequently stored in a freezer for five days, and injected into the free flow electrophoresis unit (FFEU) . The followings could be partly verified despite the bubble presence in the FFEU: (1) IgG in Space doubled that on Earth in the concentration. (2) Space electrophoresis was much stabler than that on earth. As a result, the space experiment indicated at least that space pharmaceutical production could be based on the microgravity conditions, despite the bubble problem left behind.