Airway Monitoring: Today the crew performed the setup activities for the upcoming Airway Monitoring US Lab (ambient) session. The Airway Monitoring investigation aims to determine in detail the pulmonary nitric oxide (NO) turnover in weightlessness and in combined weightless, hypobaric and hypoxic environments. The goal is also to determine the lung diffusion capacity for NO with dust particles present in the ISS atmosphere. This investigation studies the occurrence and indicators of airway inflammation in crewmembers, using ultra-sensitive gas analyzers to analyze exhaled air. This will help to identify health impacts and support maintenance of crewmember well-being on future human spaceflight missions, such as to the Moon and Mars, where crewmembers will have to be more self-sufficient in identifying and avoiding such conditions.

Functional Immune: HRF saliva collections were performed in support of the end-of-mission sample collection. Functional Immune analyzes blood and saliva samples to determine the changes taking place in crewmembers’ immune systems during flight. The changes in the immune system are also compared with crewmembers’ self-reported health information. Results are expected to provide new insight into the possible health risks of long-duration space travel, including future missions to Mars, asteroids, or other distant destinations.

Nanoracks Module 74: Today a crewmember placed the 6 microplates into Plate Reader-2 for scanning, and then stowed them back into Module-74. The Module-74 experiment investigates the Effects of Microgravity on Controlled Release of Antibiotics and Curing Mechanism of a Novel Wound Dressing (Hydrogel Formation and Drug Release in Microgravity Conditions) and studies the formation and drug release from cross-linked or mixed hydrogels in microgravity.

Crystallization of LRRK2 Under Microgravity Conditions-2 (CASIS PCG-16) microscope observations: The crew performed a microscope observation on the PCG-16 Card that was loaded three weeks ago. CASIS PCG-16 evaluates growth of Leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2) protein crystals in microgravity. LRRK2 is implicated in Parkinson’s disease, but crystals of the protein grown on Earth are too small and compact to study. Detailed analysis of larger, space-grown crystals can define the protein’s exact shape and morphology and help scientists better understand the disease’s pathology.

Rodent Research-8 (RR-8): The crew performed a Habitat restock for units 1-4 and a cleaning of the animal access unit. During the Habitat restock activities, mold was observed on 2 of the food bars. One of these bars was trashed. The small spots of mold on the other food bar were scraped off prior to installation. The RR-8 investigation utilizes mice flown aboard the ISS, and maintained on Earth, to investigate the physiology of aging in response to microgravity and the role of aging in the onset and progression of disease. The mice on-board ISS consist of 40 total mice divided into 2 age groups.

SpaceX-16 Cargo Operations: The crew completed cargo unloading from the Dragon vehicle last week. This week, the Crew has started to pack items for return. Approximately 26 hours of cargo loading remains to be completed in preparation for Dragon’s departure on January 13, 2019.

Mobile Servicing System (MSS) Operations: On Saturday December 15, the Robotic Ground Controllers translated the Mobile Transporter (MT) from Worksite (WS) 6 to 7. Then, they maneuvered the Space Station Robotic Manipulator System (SSRMS) to grapple the Special Purpose Dextrous Manipulator (SPDM). Following that, the SSRMS maneuvered SPDM towards still grappled to the Robotic Refueling Mission 3 (RRM3) Flight Releasable Attachment Mechanism (FRAM) and successfully installed it onto its final location on Express Logistics Carrier 1 (ELC1) site 3. On Sunday, they maneuvered the SSRMS and stowed SPDM on the Mobile Base System (MBS) Power Data Fixture (PDGF) #2. After SSRMS released SPDM PDGF, the MT was translated from WS7 to WS4. Finally, SSRMS was maneuvered as required to Walk off onto Lab PDGF and SSRMS was position at park position.

Completed Task List Activities:

CHeCS Rack Trash Gather (GMT 349)

Photo documentation of the temp stow location of Dosis Passive Detector Pouch (GMT 349)

Food Label (GMT 349)

ISS Crew Handover Self Study for New Crewmembers (GMT 349)

iPad Questionnaire (GMT 349)

mobiPV Unplug and Stowage (GMT 349)

Waste and Hygiene Compartment Control Panel Protection (GMT 349)

Symbolic (GMT 349 and 350)

Portable Computer System (PCS) Hard Drive (HD) Swap and Image (GMT 350)

Repack and Trash of FSL items (GMT 349, 350, 351)

Waste and Hygiene Compartment Control Panel Protection (GMT 351)

Ground Activities:

All activities are complete unless otherwise noted.



LSR Troubleshooting

Two Day Look Ahead:

Tuesday, 12/18:

Payloads



CSA/At Home in Space

ESA/Airway Monitoring

DECLIC remove

Functional Immune

ESA/Grip

Functional Immune

Lighting Effects

FIR/LMM/APEX plate remove

Meteor

NR-module 74 scan

Tangolab-2

Team Task Switching

Systems

JEMRMS Ops to relocate SEDA-AP from EFU 11 to 13 in prep for Jettison December 21

Wednesday, 12/19:

Payloads



Bone Densitometer calibration

ESA/Biolab TCU Cleaning

Functional Immune

Lighting effects

Microbial Tracking-2

NR-module 74 scan

Standard Measures

Time Perception

Team Task Switching

Systems

Soyuz 55S Undocking

Today’s Planned Activities:

All activities are complete unless otherwise noted.

