Operational Characteristics

• Chronic exposures (with stops for animal husbandry) to 3G
• Small animal, plant and hardware payloads
• Continuous data and video acquisition
• Rotational and stationary controls

Performance limits and specifications Radius: 12 ft Payload: 100 lbs per enclosure (max) Max G: 3 G Max RPM: 30.5 RPM

The 24-Foot Diameter Centrifuge is designed to create hypergravitational research conditions for small animal plant and hardware payloads. The centrifuge has 10 radial arms. Each arm holds two opaque enclosures (2.2ftx3.2ftx1.8ft.) There are 16 different enclosure mounting locations on each arm. Thus, various combinations of gravity levels can be introduced during a centrifuge run. The enclosures may be used to hold up to 4 rodent cages or other animal holding units as needed. Three smaller enclosures are located near the center of rotation to house animals used as rotational controls for centrifugation.

All enclosures on the centrifuge are balanced and suspended from gimbaled yokes. This allows the enclosures to swing freely with centrifugation, thus providing the resultant gravitational force vector at the center of the cage enclosure floor. Ten stationary enclosures are located in the same room as the centrifuge. Animals housed in the stationary enclosures experience the same environmental conditions as those on the centrifuge, but do not experience the rotational effects.

Power is provided to equipment onboard and animal enclosures are illuminated by fluorescent lighting on a programmable light/dark cycle. Instrumentation and video signals are available off-board in the science support area for viewing and/or recording. Adjacent support rooms are available for animal preparation, animal testing, and sample collection.