By Jackson Howard, Social Media Intern 

It was like any other normal afternoon in May of 2008, when Mary Ann Colley, at the time head of Butterfly Pavilion’s curatorial team and currently Butterfly Pavilion Chief Operating Officer, received a call she would never forget. A representative from BioServe Space Technologies was on the other end of the line. BioServe had a new project working with butterflies and spiders that would take place in... space and they needed to bring in an expert to guide them through this uncharted territory. Mary Ann silently danced at her desk with excitement and happily accepted the position of Head Butterfly Consultant. She began working with BioServe and Engineering students from the University of Colorado on creating a small habitat that would safely and viably accommodate animals in space.  

“This was the start of a special relationship which has spanned over several years and three separate flights into space all in an effort to further our understanding of invertebrate adaptations.”  - Mary Ann 

You may be wondering… 

Why in the world, wait no, out of this world, would anyone want to send butterflies and spiders into space?  

The answer to that may surprise you. Animals as astronauts have actually been “exploring” space long before Alan Shepard’s 1961 successful suborbital flight. Prior to human astronauts, scientists were interested in investigating the space environment and seeing if living things could survive a space vacuum, wide temperature extremes, and cosmic radiation while in an egg-like capsule.  

While we have come an exceptionally long way from those early space missions and experiments, there is still extreme value in these unique research opportunities. The environment that is created in space offers scientists a chance to do something they cannot do for more than a few seconds on Earth – control the variable gravity. On this planet, scientists can only control variables such as temperature, chemical composition, light and other radiation, magnetic fields, pressure, and so on. One variable that has always been out of their full control was gravity. We could only speculate the effects of microgravity on living things.  

Today, space flight helps scientists answer these types of questions. While the International Space Station (ISS) is in Earth’s orbit, a unique environment is created which is called microgravity. “The weightless environment of space flight allows scientists to better understand gravity-dependent biological phenomena. Investigations focus on how the space environment can be used as a commercially viable tool, eventually becoming a "value added" factor for a commercial product or process.” (BioServe website) 

Scientists are also curious in seeing if microgravity affects an animal’s behavior. Do spiders adapt to a lack of up and down and spin normal webs? Can a butterfly wings pump to normal shapes or do they remain wrinkled? How successful are spiders and butterflies at feeding? This ability to control gravity provides scientists with a whole universe of new questions to begin to answer.  

Another unique component of these three programs were that they were designed to bring science into the classroom; countless students were able participate in near real time experiments conducted on the International Space Station. Classes created and observed ground control habitats in their classroom while downloading images and video from the ISS experiment/space flight habitats. Students asked questions, created hypotheses, and observed the differences of web building with gravity and in micro gravity.  

In 2008, ten lucky junior high schools based in Colorado and Texas followed the flight’s progress and evaluated and compared the differences between the effects of gravity on Earth and microgravity in space on animal life. The original 2008 pilot program lead way for two additional programs which were further developed and studied. Now, young scientists have the chance to follow Golden Orb Weaver spiders, Painted Lady and Monarch butterflies while in space by viewing photographs and video feed from the ISS and then comparing their findings to their own versions of the experiment here on Earth.  

The final outcome… 

During the first flight/experiment in 2008, the spiders were flown with fruit flies, which were originally intended to reproduce slowly and provide a steady source of food. Unfortunately, the fruit fly population grew so rapidly that the crawling fruit fly larvae quite literally “slimed” the interior of the spiders’ living chamber and the images became blurred. On this same mission the Painted Lady butterflies struggled and did not successfully go through their metamorphosis. 

After learning critical points of interest, the second flight and experimentation in 2009 was a major success! Four Painted Lady and three Monarch butterflies emerged successfully from their chrysalises. 

In 2011, two golden orb weaver spiders, Nephila clavipe, launched to the International Space Station on May 16, 2011, on Endeavour Space Shuttle Mission STS-134, the last flight for the shuttle Endeavour. The spiders became very special members to the flight crew and were named Esmerelda and Gladys, by an astronaut on the International Space Station. The spiders began having photos and video taken and downloaded to the BioServe Payload Operation and Control Center to allow educational partners and students across the nation to see these spiders’ behavior in micro gravity. The spiders immediately began spinning web, had successful molting (shedding of exoskeleton to grow), and acclimated well to their new habitat. Not long after launch Gladys molted into an adult male and his name was quickly changed to Glen!  

The spiders continued to have success throughout their time in space creating webs that were very similar to webs made in the ground control habitats, but there were a few instances when the spiders became obviously disoriented and created messy webs or in one case created two webs that were a mirror image of each other. Otherwise, the spiders continued to have success throughout their time in space creating webs that were very similar to webs made in the ground control habitats. 

Upon return to Earth only Glen survived and was on display for a short time at  Butterfly Pavilion.  

NASA’s Destination Station tour stopped at Butterfly Pavilion on September 24, 2011 with Astronaut Kjell Lindgren. The day was filled with talks from Kjell Lindgren, Destination Station Space Suit Engineers and Butterfly Pavilion’s Mary Ann Colley. Displays of past experiments of Butterflies and Spiders in Space were displayed with preserved specimen, BioServe Space Technologies’ habitats and equipment and educational activities from NASA Outreach.  

“It was a tremendous honor personally and for Butterfly Pavilion to participate in a space program involving invertebrates and furthering research and education around these tiny, but mighty, creatures.” Said Mary Ann Colley. 

Mi•crograv•i•ty mikro - gravite
An environment created by freefall in which gravity’s effects are greatly reduced.