SpaceX's CRS-35 cargo flight carries four NASA health and biology experiments to the ISS

SpaceX/Dragon

NASA's 35th commercial resupply mission with SpaceX, CRS-35, is set to launch from Cape Canaveral with cargo for the International Space Station. Four research investigations aboard study how spaceflight affects brain tissue, crop disease, rapid onboard health testing and drug-resistant bacteria. NASA says the results will inform astronaut health protections and research on Earth.

• Lab-grown human brain models will spend five weeks on the station, compared with identical models kept on Earth.
• Crops grown in orbit and on Earth are both infected with a fungus, to test whether disease progresses faster in microgravity.
• The first flight test of a compact microplate reader, which could measure antibodies and proteins on the station instead of after samples return to Earth.
• The GEARS study of antibiotic-resistant bacteria returns for its fourth and final planned stay, with astronauts sampling station surfaces repeatedly.