Author: Neville

Eye-opener as scientists grow lens cells

Date January 31, 2013 15 reading now

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Bridie Smith

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It’s just started: Researcher Professor Tiziano Barberi. Photo: Simon Schluter

RESEARCHERS have established a way to grow human eye lens cells in the laboratory – the first time this has been done at 100 per cent purity.

The discovery means patients suffering congenital sight impairment caused by lens damage such as cataracts might one day be able to have a transplant, allowing them to grow an eye lens without the genetic defects their DNA would otherwise dictate.

The researchers from Monash University’s Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute took stem cells and isolated the lens epithelium – the embryonic tissue from which the lens of the eye develops.

After isolating the cells from other cultures, Tiziano Barberi and Isabella Mengarelli then enabled the embryonic tissue to develop into lens cells in a culture dish.

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This last step is often a challenge for scientists, as pluripotent stem cells have the ability to become any cell in the human body including skin, blood and brain matter. Once the stem cells have begun to differentiate, the trick is to control the process and produce only the desired cells – in this case lens cells. ”The cells that we grew and then isolated kept growing in a separate dish and they were able only to become lens cells,” Professor Barberi said.

”This is the fundamental step that is required for anything you want to make starting from pluripotent stem cells.”

Whether their use is for testing new drugs or for transplantation into a patient, it is crucial to establish that the cells are pure. If they are not, then there is the potential for the cells to develop into cells other than eye lens cells.

”If you are able to purify them, then you can test anything and see what happens to that particular cell type. You can study toxicity or drug reaction in vitro,” Professor Barberi said.

Published in Stem Cells Translational Medicine this month, the results could also speed up research because of the potential to allow scientists to conduct tests on human cells earlier – reducing the reliance on animal testing.

Human stem cells were first isolated in the late 1990s, making this field of scientific research relatively young.

”It’s just started,” Professor Barberi said. ”There will be many other advances in the future.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/eyeopener-as-scientists-grow-lens-cells-20130130-2dl7q.html#ixzz2JVAzWCyK

Council amalgamations ‘will not save money’ says research by Jeff Tate Consulting

Vikki Campion
The Daily Telegraph
January 30, 20135:35PM

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A NEW report on council amalgamations warns awards and laws that mandate no forced redundancies for three years create overstuffed bureaucracies and would not save money.

It reveals NSW’s past councils mergers were “poorly planned”, stifling proper reform and leaving councils cash strapped and communities unhappy with infrastructure.

Research by Jeff Tate Consulting reviewed council amalgamations focusing on mergers in NSW which saw 42 councils combined eight years ago.

“The processes adopted for planning and implementing the (2004) reforms were generally seen as being poor and the costs were significant,” it found.

“Overall, however, the amalgamations and boundary changes have provided important benefits to the communities and staff of those councils.”

The report, which was commissioned for a sweeping reform of NSW council’s, found mandating a three year no forced redundancies period made “it almost impossible to achieve savings from amalgamations in the short term and has the potential to normalise inefficient organisation structures and overstaffing”.

It found that legislative or award limitations on transferring staff to new work locations, and providing ongoing compensation if they were transferred, “leads to unreasonable costs many years into the future”.

“It also creates different remuneration levels for people doing the same or similar work based on whether they became employees before or after the amalgamation and works against establishing and maintaining a new, single organisation culture that is part of the notion of a new start after an amalgamation,” the report found.

It calls on councils to make the difficult decisions “including reducing staff numbers” early on in the amalgamation, with savings in staff costs more likely to be in white collar roles.

“Grievance procedures need to be in place for staff who feel aggrieved by decisions during the amalgamation process,” it said.

The report also calls on State Government to help councils fund the mergers because the costs associated with amalgamation had been underestimated in the past.

Across NSW councils, there are more than 1500 councillors and about 50,000 employed staff.

“Poor planning and implementation processes combined with legal, industrial and proclamation restrictions have increased costs, extended the negative impacts associated with amalgamations and hampered the achievement of positive outcomes,” the report said.

Independent Review Panel Chair Professor Graham Sansom said the research would inform the panel’s recommendations.

“The panel has made it clear that we believe consolidation of councils will be a significant element of strengthening local government,” he said.

“The panel is well aware that amalgamations and boundary changes need to be carefully planned and handled sensitively, particularly in relation to maintaining local employment,” he said.

“The report’s finding that amalgamations have improved services and efficiency whilst increasing job opportunities is particularly significant.”

Tomorrow’s Life-Saving Medications May Currently Be Living at the Bottom of the Sea

Jan. 29, 2013 — OHSU researchers, in partnership with scientists from several other institutions, have published two new research papers that signal how the next class of powerful medications may currently reside at the bottom of the ocean. In both cases, the researchers were focused on ocean-based mollusks — a category of animal that includes snails, clams and squid and their bacterial companions.

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Sea life studies aid researchers in several ways, including the development of new medications and biofuels. Because many of these ocean animal species have existed in harmony with their bacteria for millions of years, these benign bacteria have devised molecules that can affect body function without side effects and therefore better fight disease.

To generate these discoveries, a research partnership called the Philippine Mollusk Symbiont International Cooperative Biodiversity Group was formed. As the name suggests, the group specifically focuses on mollusks, a large phylum of invertebrate animals, many of which live under the sea. Margo Haygood, Ph.D., an OHSU marine microbiologist, leads the group, with partners at the University of the Philippines, the University of Utah, The Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia and Ocean Genome Legacy. Both of these newly published papers are the result of the efforts of this research group.

Here are brief summaries of the two studies:

Shipworms: The source of a new antibiotic

The paper focuses on a unique animal called a shipworm, which despite its name is not a worm. Shipworms are mollusks and are clam-like creatures that use their shells as drills and feed on wood by burrowing into the wood fibers. They are best known for affixing themselves to the sides of wooden ships. Over time, their wood feeding causes serious damage to the hull of those ships.

The research team initially focused on shipworms because the animals’ creative use of bacteria to convert wood — a poor food source lacking proteins or nitrogen — into a suitable food source where the animal can both live and feed.

This research revealed that one form of bacteria utilized by shipworms secretes a powerful antibiotic, which may hold promise for combatting human diseases.

“The reason why this line of research is so critical is because antibiotic resistance is a serious threat to human health,” said Margo Haygood, Ph.D., a member of the OHSU Institute of Environmental Health and a professor of science and engineering in the OHSU School of Medicine.

“Antibiotics have helped humans battle infectious diseases for over 70 years. However, the dangerous organisms these medications were designed to protect us against have adapted due to widespread use. Without a new class of improved antibiotics, older medications are becoming less and less effective and we need to locate new antibiotics to keep these diseases at bay. Bacteria that live in harmony with animals are a promising source. ”

Cone snails: Another possible yet surprising source for new medicines

A team led by researchers from the University of Utah, and including OHSU and the University of the Philippines researchers, took part in a separate study of cone snails collected in the Philippines. Cone snails are also mollusks. There have been few previous studies to determine if bacteria associated with these snails might assist in drug development. This is because the snails have thick shells and they can also defend themselves through the use of toxic venoms. Because of the existence of these significant defensive measures, it was assumed that the bacteria they carry do not have to produce additional chemical defenses that might also translate into human medications. The latest research shows that this previous assumption is incorrect.

The research demonstrated how bacteria carried by cone snails produce a chemical that is neuroactive, meaning that it impacts the function of nerve cells, called neurons, in the brain. Such chemicals have promise for treatment of pain.

“Mollusks with external shells, like the cone snail, were previously overlooked in the search for new antibiotics and other medications,” said, Eric Schmidt, Ph.D., a biochemist at the university of Utah and lead author of the article.

“This discovery tells us that these animals also produce compounds worth studying. It’s hoped that these studies may also provide us with valuable knowledge that will help us combat disease.”

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Antarctic Lake Beneath the Ice Sheet Tested

Jan. 29, 2013 — In a first-of-its-kind feat of science and engineering, a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded research team has successfully drilled through 800 meters (2,600 feet) of Antarctic ice to reach a subglacial lake and retrieve water and sediment samples that have been isolated from direct contact with the atmosphere for many thousands of years.

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Scientists and drillers with the interdisciplinary Whillans Ice Stream Subglacial Access Research Drilling project (WISSARD) announced Jan. 28 local time (U.S. stations in Antarctica keep New Zealand time) that they had used a customized clean hot-water drill to directly obtain samples from the waters and sediments of subglacial Lake Whillans.

The samples may contain microscopic life that has evolved uniquely to survive in conditions of extreme cold and lack of light and nutrients. Studying the samples may help scientists understand not only how life can survive in other extreme ecosystems on Earth, but also on other icy worlds in our solar system.

The WISSARD teams’ accomplishment, the researchers said, “hails a new era in polar science, opening a window for future interdisciplinary science in one of Earth’s last unexplored frontiers.”

A massive ice sheet, almost two miles thick in places, covers more than 95 percent of the Antarctic continent. Only in recent decades have airborne and satellite radar and other mapping technologies revealed that a vast, subglacial system of rivers and lakes exists under the ice sheet. Lakes vary in size, with the largest being Vostok Subglacial Lake in the Antarctic interior that is comparable in size to Lake Ontario.

WISSARD targeted a smaller lake (1.2 square miles in area), where several lakes appear linked to each other and may drain to the ocean, as the first project to obtain clean, intact samples of water and sediments from a subglacial lake.

The achievement is the culmination of more than a decade of international and national planning and 3 1/2 years of project preparation by the WISSARD consortium of U.S. universities and two international contributors. There are 13 WISSARD principal investigators representing eight different U.S. institutions.

NSF, which manages the United States Antarctic Program, provided over $10 million in grants as part of NSF’s International Polar Year portfolio to support the WISSARD science and development of related technologies.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Cryospheric Sciences Program, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the private Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation also provided support for the project.

The interdisciplinary research team includes groups of experts in the following areas of science: life in icy environments, led by John Priscu, of Montana State University; glacial geology, led by Ross Powell, of Northern Illinois University; and glacial hydrology, led by Slawek Tulaczyk, of the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Sharing of expertise by the groups of disciplinary experts will allow the data collected to be cast in a systemic, global context.

The WISSARD team will now process the water and sediment samples they have collected in hopes of answering seminal questions related to the structure and function of subglacial microbial life, climate history and contemporary ice-sheet dynamics.

Video surveys of the lake floor and measurements of selected physical and chemical properties of the waters and sediments will allow the team to further characterize the lake and its environs.

The approach to drilling was guided by recommendations in the 2007 National Research Council-sponsored report, “Exploration of Antarctic Subglacial Aquatic Environments: Environmental and Scientific Stewardship,” aimed to protect these unique environments from contamination.

A team of engineers and technicians directed by Frank Rack, of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, designed, developed and fabricated the specialized hot-water drill that was fitted with a filtration and germicidal UV system to prevent contamination of the subglacial environment and to recover clean samples for microbial analyses. In addition, the numerous customized scientific samplers and instruments used for this project were also carefully cleaned before being lowered into the borehole through the ice and into the lake.

Following their successful retrieval, the samples are now being carefully prepared for their shipment off the ice and back to laboratories for numerous chemical and biological analyses over the coming weeks and months.

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2013 Australian Electoral Pendulum

The electoral pendulum set out below shows the margins for all electorates at the next commonwealth election due in the second half of 2013. Seats are ordered from most vulnerable to safest. The margins have been adjusted to take account of redistributions in Victoria and South Australia.

The Victorian redistribution is now complete and the margins shown have been estimated by Stephen Barber of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library. The South Australian estimates are my calculations based on draft electoral boundaries released in August. Only three objections have been lodged to the draft boundaries so little change is expected when the final boundaries are released later this year.

The Nielsen poll published earlier this week had the Coalition on 58% of the two-party preferred vote. Assuming the swing is uniform, the 7.9% swing to the Coalition shown by the poll would see the Labor Party lose 35 of its 72 seats, half of the party caucus. Labor would be left with just 37 seats, fewer than the 49 seats retained by Labor on the defeat of the Keating government in 1996, and nearly as bad as the 1975 result when Labor held just 36 seats in a smaller 127 seat Parliament.

The new South Australian boundaries will not be legally in force until gazetted at the end of this year. Any election held before the end of this year would be on the old electoral boundaries and the pendulum would need to be adjusted to use the old South Australian margins. (I analysed the draft South Australian boundaries at this post.)

In October the Electoral Commissioner will issue a determination on whether the entitlement of any state to House seats under Section 24 of the Constitution has changed. This determination will be based on Australia Bureau of Statistics population figures. The trend in population figures indicates no change in state entitlement so no further redistribution will take place in this term. A scheduled redistribution of the ACT in early 2013 will be deferred as it is within the last 12 months of the parliamentary term.

The pendulum includes National WA MP Tony Crook on the cross-benches as he has stated he is not part of the Coalition. The margins for Batman and Grayndler are shown with a two-party preferred margin despite the Greens finishing second at the 2010 election. The Liberal Party has been moving to a position of directing preferences against the Greens at the next election, a move that would make nonsense of any Labor-Green margin. The same comment would apply to the Green margin versus Labor shown for the seat of Melbourne.

One caveat on the pendulum is that the huge difference in state results at the 2010 election makes a uniform swing unlikely. (I broke the 2010 result down by state in this post.) Labor is more vulnerable in Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania where the Coalition had very poor results in 2010, and especially in New South Wales where Labor won a majority of seats with a minority of the two-party preferred results. Despite endless commentary about the state of Labor’s polling in Western Australia and Queensland, the next election will not be decided in those states.

A new version of the pendulum will be published once more accurate estimates for the new South Australian electorates are available. The AEC will not publish its estimates of new margins until shortly before the election.
2013 Australian Electoral Pendulum
Labor (72) Corangamite (VIC) ALP 0.3%
Deakin (VIC) ALP 0.6%
Greenway (NSW) ALP 0.9%
Robertson (NSW) ALP 1.0%
Lindsay (NSW) ALP 1.1%
Moreton (QLD) ALP 1.1%
Banks (NSW) ALP 1.5%
La Trobe (VIC) ALP 1.7%
Petrie (QLD) ALP 2.5%
Reid (NSW) ALP 2.7%
Lilley (QLD) ALP 3.2%
Brand (WA) ALP 3.3%
Capricornia (QLD) ALP 3.7%
Lingiari (NT) ALP 3.7%
Page (NSW) ALP 4.2%
Eden-Monaro (NSW) ALP 4.2%
Blair (QLD) ALP 4.2%
Parramatta (NSW) ALP 4.4%
Dobell (NSW) ALP 5.1%
Kingsford Smith (NSW) ALP 5.2%
Rankin (QLD) ALP 5.4%
Fremantle (WA) ALP 5.7%
Chisholm (VIC) ALP 5.8%
Oxley (QLD) ALP 5.8%
Perth (WA) ALP 5.9%
Hindmarsh (SA) ALP 6.1%
Bass (TAS) ALP 6.7%
Werriwa (NSW) ALP 6.8%
Barton (NSW) ALP 6.9%
Richmond (NSW) ALP 7.0%
Braddon (TAS) ALP 7.5%
Adelaide (SA) ALP 7.5%
Bruce (VIC) ALP 7.7%
McMahon (NSW) ALP 7.8%
Melbourne Ports (VIC) ALP 7.9%
Griffith (QLD) ALP 8.5%
Fowler (NSW) ALP 8.8%
Watson (NSW) ALP 9.1%
Canberra (ACT) ALP 9.2%
McEwen (VIC) ALP 9.2%
Bendigo (VIC) ALP 9.4%
Isaacs (VIC) ALP 10.4%
Wakefield (SA) ALP 10.5%
Franklin (TAS) ALP 10.8%
Jagajaga (VIC) ALP 11.1%
Ballarat (VIC) ALP 11.7%
Makin (SA) ALP 12.0%
Throsby (NSW) ALP 12.1%
Blaxland (NSW) ALP 12.2%
Lyons (TAS) ALP 12.3%
Chifley (NSW) ALP 12.3%
Hunter (NSW) ALP 12.5%
Newcastle (NSW) ALP 12.5%
Charlton (NSW) ALP 12.7%
Shortland (NSW) ALP 12.9%
Cunningham (NSW) ALP 13.2%
Corio (VIC) ALP 13.5%
Hotham (VIC) ALP 14.0%
Holt (VIC) ALP 14.0%
Fraser (ACT) ALP 14.2%
Kingston (SA) ALP 14.5%
Sydney (NSW) ALP 17.1%
Maribyrnong (VIC) ALP 17.5%
Calwell (VIC) ALP 20.0%
Grayndler (NSW) ALP 20.6%
Scullin (VIC) ALP 20.6%
Port Adelaide (SA) ALP 21.0%
Lalor (VIC) ALP 22.1%
Wills (VIC) ALP 23.5%
Gorton (VIC) ALP 23.6%
Gellibrand (VIC) ALP 24.1%
Batman (VIC) ALP 24.8%

Coalition (72) Boothby (SA) LIB 0.6%
Hasluck (WA) LIB 0.6%
Aston (VIC) LIB 0.7%
Dunkley (VIC) LIB 1.1%
Brisbane (QLD) LNP 1.1%
Macquarie (NSW) LIB 1.3%
Forde (QLD) LNP 1.6%
Solomon (NT) CLP 1.8%
Longman (QLD) LNP 1.9%
Casey (VIC) LIB 1.9%
Herbert (QLD) LNP 2.2%
Canning (WA) LIB 2.2%
Dawson (QLD) LNP 2.4%
Swan (WA) LIB 2.5%
Bonner (QLD) LNP 2.8%
Macarthur (NSW) LIB 3.0%
Bennelong (NSW) LIB 3.1%
Flynn (QLD) LNP 3.6%
Sturt (SA) LIB 3.6%
Fisher (QLD) LNP 4.1%
McMillan (VIC) LIB 4.2%
Leichhardt (QLD) LNP 4.6%
Dickson (QLD) LNP 5.1%
Hughes (NSW) LIB 5.2%
Gilmore (NSW) LIB 5.3%
Paterson (NSW) LIB 5.3%
Higgins (VIC) LIB 5.4%
Stirling (WA) LIB 5.6%
Wannon (VIC) LIB 5.7%
Goldstein (VIC) LIB 6.0%
Cowan (WA) LIB 6.3%
Fairfax (QLD) LNP 7.0%
Ryan (QLD) LNP 7.2%
Mayo (SA) LIB 7.3%
Kooyong (VIC) LIB 7.5%
Menzies (VIC) LIB 8.7%
Hume (NSW) LIB 8.7%
Forrest (WA) LIB 8.7%
Pearce (WA) LIB 8.9%
Indi (VIC) LIB 9.0%
Flinders (VIC) LIB 9.1%
Cowper (NSW) NAT 9.3%
Wright (QLD) LNP 10.2%
McPherson (QLD) LNP 10.3%
Hinkler (QLD) LNP 10.4%
Bowman (QLD) LNP 10.4%
Calare (NSW) NAT 10.7%
Grey (SA) LIB 11.2%
Moore (WA) LIB 11.2%
Gippsland (VIC) NAT 11.5%
Tangney (WA) LIB 12.3%
Cook (NSW) LIB 12.7%
Barker (SA) LIB 13.0%
Warringah (NSW) LIB 13.1%
Durack (WA) LIB 13.7%
North Sydney (NSW) LIB 14.1%
Fadden (QLD) LNP 14.2%
Farrer (NSW) LIB 14.5%
Wentworth (NSW) LIB 14.9%
Wide Bay (QLD) LNP 15.6%
Mackellar (NSW) LIB 15.7%
Curtin (WA) LIB 16.2%
Berowra (NSW) LIB 16.2%
Mitchell (NSW) LIB 17.2%
Moncrieff (QLD) LNP 17.5%
Riverina (NSW) NAT 18.2%
Bradfield (NSW) LIB 18.2%
Groom (QLD) LNP 18.5%
Parkes (NSW) NAT 18.9%
Murray (VIC) LIB 19.6%
Maranoa (QLD) LNP 22.9%
Mallee (VIC) NAT 23.3%
Others (IND 4, GRN 1, NAT WA 1) Denison (TAS) IND 1.2% v ALP
O’Connor (WA) NAT WA 3.6% v LIB
Melbourne (VIC) GRN 6.0% v ALP
Lyne (NSW) IND 12.7% v NAT
Kennedy (QLD) IND 18.3% v LNP
New England (NSW) IND 21.5% v NAT

Posted by Antony Green on September 14, 2011 at 10:28 AM in Federal Politics and Governments, Federal Redistributions | Permalink

Trent J. Perrotto
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
trent.j.perrotto@nasa.gov

Alan Buis
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-0474
alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov

Josh Byerly
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
josh.byerly@nasa.gov
Jan. 29, 2013 RELEASE : 13-032 NASA to Launch Ocean Wind Monitor to Space Station WASHINGTON — In a clever reuse of hardware originally built to test parts of NASA’s QuikScat satellite, the agency will launch the ISS-RapidScat instrument to the International Space Station in 2014 to measure ocean-surface wind speed and direction.

The ISS-RapidScat instrument will help improve weather forecasts, including hurricane monitoring, and understanding of how ocean-atmosphere interactions influence Earth’s climate.

“The ability for NASA to quickly reuse this hardware and launch it to the space station is a great example of a low-cost approach that will have high benefits to science and life here on Earth,” said Mike Suffredini, NASA’s International Space Station program manager.

ISS-RapidScat will help fill the data gap created when QuikScat, which was designed to last two years but operated for 10, stopped collecting ocean wind data in late 2009. A scatterometer is a microwave radar sensor used to measure the reflection or scattering effect produced while scanning the surface of Earth from an aircraft or a satellite.

NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have studied next-generation replacements for QuikScat, but a successor will not be available soon. To meet this challenge cost-effectively, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., and the agency’s station program proposed adapting leftover QuikScat hardware in combination with new hardware for use on the space station.

“ISS-RapidScat represents a low-cost approach to acquiring valuable wind vector data for improving global monitoring of hurricanes and other high-intensity storms,” said Howard Eisen, ISS-RapidScat project manager at JPL. “By leveraging the capabilities of the International Space Station and recycling leftover hardware, we will acquire good science data at a fraction of the investment needed to launch a new satellite.”

ISS-RapidScat will have measurement accuracy similar to QuikScat’s and will survey all regions of Earth accessible from the space station’s orbit. The instrument will be launched to the space station aboard a SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft. It will be installed on the end of the station’s Columbus laboratory as an autonomous payload requiring no interaction by station crew members. It is expected to operate aboard the station for two years.

ISS-RapidScat will take advantage of the space station’s unique characteristics to advance understanding of Earth’s winds. Current scatterometer orbits pass the same point on Earth at approximately the same time every day. Since the space station’s orbit intersects the orbits of each of these satellites about once every hour, ISS-RapidScat can serve as a calibration standard and help scientists stitch together the data from multiple sources into a long-term record.

ISS-RapidScat also will collect measurements of Earth’s global wind field at all times of day for all locations. Variations in winds caused by the sun can play a significant role in the formation of tropical clouds and tropical systems that play a dominant role in Earth’s water and energy cycles. ISS-RapidScat observations will help scientists understand these phenomena better and improve weather and climate models.

The ISS-RapidScat project is a joint partnership of JPL and NASA’s International Space Station Program Office at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, with support from the Earth Science Division of the Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

For more information on NASA’s scatterometry missions, visit:

http://winds.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm

For more information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

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