page_title: Animals in space
section_title: 1990s
hierarchical_section_title: Animals in space / 1990s
caption_attribution_description: English: STS-65 Mission Specialist Donald A. Thomas is seen in the spacelab science module at the Rack 1 Workbench making an observation of one of the newts. Smaller organisms, such as the newts, are able to develop from embryos and hatch during the mission as part of an overall program to determine if development occurs normally in the space environment. Temporary home for the newts, the Aquatic Animal Experiment Unit (AAEU) (out of frame) also contained medaka and goldfish. Thomas joined five other NASA astronauts and a Japanese payload specialist for two weeks of experimenting onboard the Space Shuttle Columbia, Orbiter Vehicle (OV) 102, in Earth orbit.
context_page_description: Non-human animals in space originally served to test the survivability of spaceflight, before human spaceflights were attempted. Later, other non-human animals were flown to investigate various biological processes and the effects microgravity and space flight might have on them. Bioastronautics is an area of bioengineering research which spans the study and support of life in space. To date, seven national space programs have flown animals into space: the Soviet Union, the United States, France, Argentina, China, Japan and Iran.
  A wide variety of non-human animals have been launched into space, including monkeys, apes, dogs, cats, tortoises, mice, frogs, and insects. The United States launched flights containing monkeys and apes primarily between 1948 and 1961 with one flight in 1969 and one in 1985. France launched two monkey-carrying flights in 1967. The Soviet Union and Russia launched monkeys between 1983 and 1996. During the 1950s and 1960s, the Soviet space program used a number of dogs for sub-orbital and orbital space flights.
  Two tortoises and a variety of insects were the first inhabitants of Earth to circle the Moon, on the 1968 Zond 5 mission.
context_section_description: Four monkeys flew aboard the last Bion flights of the Soviet Union as well as frogs and fruit flies. The Foton program flights carried dormant brine shrimp (Artemia franciscana), newts, fruit flies, and sand desert beetles (Trigonoscelis gigas).
  China launched guinea pigs in 1990.
  Toyohiro Akiyama, a Japanese journalist, carried Japanese tree frogs with him during his trip to the Mir space station in December 1990. Other biological experiments aboard Mir involved quail eggs.
  Japan launched its first animals, a species of newt, into space on 18 March 1995 aboard the Space Flyer Unit.
  During the 1990s the U.S. carried crickets, mice, rats, frogs, newts, fruit flies, snails, carp, medaka (rice fish), oyster toadfish, sea urchins, swordtail fish, gypsy moth eggs, stick insect eggs, brine shrimp (Artemia salina), quail eggs, and jellyfish aboard Space Shuttles.
caption: Astronaut Donald Thomas examines a newt on the Space Shuttle Columbia during a 1994 mission
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