title: Countermeasure for space flight effects on immune system: nutritional nucleotides.
abstract: Microgravity and its environment have adverse effects on the immune system. Abnormal immune responses observed in microgravity may pose serious consequences, especially for the recent directions of NASA for long-term space missions to Moon, Mars and deep Space exploration. The study of space flight immunology is limited due to relative inaccessibility, difficulty of performing experiments in space, and inadequate provisions in this area in the United States and Russian space programs (Taylor 1993). Microgravity and stress experienced during space flights results in immune system aberration (Taylor 1993). In ground-based mouse models for some of the microgravity effects on the human body, hindlimb unloading (HU) has been reported to cause abnormal cell proliferation and cytokine production (Armstrong et al., 1993, Chapes et al. 1993). In this report, we document that a nutritional nucleotide supplementation as studied in ground-based microgravity analogs, has potential to serve as a countermeasure for the immune dysfunction observed in space travel.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Medical School and GSBS, Univ. of Texas Health Science Center, USA.
authors.forename: A D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Kulkarni
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Yamauchi
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sundaresan
authors.forename: G T
authors.initials: GT
authors.lastname: Ramesh
authors.forename: N R
authors.initials: NR
authors.lastname: Pellis
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D016207:Cytokines / Q000096:biosynthesis; D005260:Female; D005526:Food, Formulated; D019417:Hindlimb Suspension; D007109:Immunity / Q000187:drug effects*; D008213:Lymphocyte Activation / Q000187:drug effects; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D012313:RNA / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D012399:Rotation; D013154:Spleen / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000276:immunology; D014498:Uracil / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D018544:Weightlessness Countermeasures; D018474:Weightlessness Simulation
chemical_list: D016207:Cytokines; D014498:Uracil; D012313:RNA