Houston, we have a podcast.

Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center.

This is episode 134, Sampling Science in a Lab aloft.

I'm Pat Ryan. On this podcast we talk with scientists, engineers,

astronauts, and other folks about their part in America's space exploration

program. Today we're focusing on one of the four main pillars of the mission of the International

Space Station.

Flying 250 miles up above your head, give or take, there's a science laboratory orbiting the Earth at roughly five miles a second and there have been people on that station every single day since November of 2000, more than 19 straight years and still counting.

The station was built and is operated by partners from five international space agencies,

which promotes international cooperation.

It has served as a destination in space, encouraging commercialization of

space light and space research. Served as a place to learn what we need to know to

return astronauts to the moon and send them to Mars and done it all

while supporting scientific research that has meant history making achievements

for science and for life here on Earth.

And I don't mean this is like high school science classes.

I'm talking about cool things like the first ever sequencing of unknown microbes in space

and determining how cells repair damaged DNA in space using 3D

biological printers to produce usable human tissue just for starters. Our guest today is Dr. Kurt Costello, who was

named the International Space Station Chief Scientist last year after serving

more than three years as the deputy chief scientist.

Costello came to NASA in 2000 as a training instructor in the Mission Operations Directorate

...