Volume 5, Number 4     July/August 1997

  Technology Transfer

NASA Joins Diabetes Fight

ASA'S OFFICE OF LIFE AND MICROGRAVITY Sciences and Applications and the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation signed a Space Act Agreement to research treating and monitoring diabetes and diabetes-related problems.

NASA and the Foundation will initiate joint research activities that will build on the strengths of the two organizations and support their respective goals. The agreement also has a technology transfer mechanism to make techniques and technologies developed by NASA researchers available to the diabetes research community. No funds are exchanged under this agreement.

NASA does not have a diabetes research program, but it is conducting research that would have an impact on the fight against diabetes. NASA sponsors protein crystal growth, three-dimensional tissue culturing and non-invasive diagnostic technologies research that can support the development of improved treatments.

NASA has grown human insulin crystals on two Space Shuttle missions to a quality that has not been achieved on Earth. X-ray defraction crystallization has provided a more precise structural view of insulin molecules which could lead to new insulin therapies through improved control over the effective rate of release of insulin into the blood stream.

One example of NASA's new non-invasive diagnostic technology is a portable laser light-scattering instrument to detect cataracts and other eye abnormalities in humans.

Rafat Ansari at Lewis Research Center developed the device which sends light waves through the eye and maps how they bounce off the internal structure of the eye, including the retina and cornea. Retinopathy, or retina disease, can be caused by or accelerated by diabetes, making the disease the leading cause of adult blindness in North America. Ansari's device, used on a regular basis during eye examinations, can help with early detection of diabetes-related optical problems, which in turn, could lead to better treatment at earlier stages of the disease.

For more information, contact Michael Braukus at NASA Headquarters
Call 202/358-1979 Fax: 202/358-4344

Please mention you read about it in Innovation.