BOULDER, Colo., Nov. 12 (UPI) -- University of Colorado-Boulder scientists are sending a group of butterflies and spiders into space aboard the U.S. space agency's shuttle Endeavour.
The educational payload of spiders and butterflies destined for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's International Space Station will be closely monitored by hundreds of elementary and high school students from Colorado.
The two educational experiments that will be aboard Endeavour on its scheduled Friday launch from the Kennedy Space Center were designed and built at the school's BioServe Space Technologies department.
BioServe Director Louis Stodieck, principal investigator of the NASA-funded projects, said one will be used to compare how "space" spiders differ from Earth spiders in web spinning and feeding. The second experiment will chart the life cycle of butterflies in the low gravity of space -- from larvae to pupa to butterfly to egg -- and compare that cycle with that of earthbound butterflies.
More than a dozen middle schools from Colorado's Front Range will be participating in the educational project.
"This program is an excellent example of using a national asset like the International Space Station to inspire K-12 students in science, technology, engineering and math," Stodieck said.
