Ant Farms Sent to International Space Station to Study Microgravity Conditions
Posted on January 12, 2014
Orbital's Antares rocket launched from NASA's Wallop's Flight Facility in Virginia on Thursday, January 9. Space.com reports that there are ant farms aboard this latest mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The Ants in Space experiments will help students will compare how ants' behavior differs in space and on Earth. The experiment is similar to one in 2012, in which Nerfertiti, the Spidernaut, spent 100 days in space.
HD cameras will record the ants living on the International Space Station. Software will analyze their movement patterns and interaction rates. Students in grades K-12 will get to observe the videos in near real-time and conduct their own classroom experiments.
There will be eight different ant habitats containing three areas: nest area, Forage Area 1 and Forage Area 2. Each area is separated by a sealed doorway. Each nest area contains about 100 Tetramorium caespitum or pavement ants.
Associate International Space Station Program Scientist Tara Ruttley talks about the Ants in Space experiment in this video. Take a look:
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