NASA willannounce the first- and second-place winners of the Vascular Tissue Challenge, a prize competition to grow and sustain functioning human tissue in a lab, Wednesday, June 9. Experts will answer questions about the teams tissue engineering techniques during a special episode of NASA Science Live and media briefing.
The NASA Science Live episode will air at 3 p.m. EDT on NASA Television, the NASA app, the agencys website, the NASA Facebook, NASA Twitter and NASA YouTube channels. Viewers can submit questions on social media platforms using #AskNASA.
NASA will follow the broadcast with a media teleconference at 4:30 p.m., with audio streaming live on the agencys website.
The Vascular Tissue Challenge isa competition to increase the pace of bioengineering innovations to benefit humans on Earth and future space explorers. Researchers attempted to create lab-grown human tissues for a thick-walled organ like the heart, lung, liver, or kidney and keep it alive and functioning during a trial period.
The first team to demonstrate tissue survival and function for the duration of a 30-day trial will receive $300,000. The first-place team also will have the opportunity to advance its research on the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory. The next two teams that successfully complete trails will win $100,000 each.
