Charles River Laboratories' Endosafe-Pts Completes Journey to the International Space Station

01-16-2007: Charles River Laboratories International, Inc. announced that its portable endotoxin testing system, the Endosafe(R) - PTS(TM), was recently launched into space aboard the space shuttle Discovery and successfully reached the International Space Station as part of NASA's ongoing efforts to conduct biological research in space.

The Endosafe(R)-PTS(TM) is a handheld endotoxin detection system that was licensed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July 2006 and is currently in use in pharmaceutical and biotechnology facilities around the world as a release method for drug products due to its ease of use and rapid results. The PTS(TM) was modified for spaceflight by Charles River Laboratories in collaboration with NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) science team, Lab-on-a-Chip Application Development (LOCAD), and Carnegie Institution of Washington. The LOCAD-PTS shall help astronaut-scientists perform biological studies necessary for an extended human presence in space, from crew health and spacecraft environmental studies to the search for life elsewhere in the solar system. Initially, it will provide rapid analysis to determine if certain types of bacteria are present on various space station surfaces. In the future, interchangeable system components shall enable station crews to monitor their environment for contaminants such as yeast, mold and, eventually, more virulent and potentially harmful bacteria - such as E. coli and Salmonella.