In general, research in life-sciences is drastically accelerated at negligible costs on board the SpaceLand “flying laboratory” engineered and operated by the SpaceLand engineers and scientists to provide microgravity and low-gravity conditions to the science and technology community.
This modus operandi allows to speed up research, analysis, design, development, testing and qualification of equipment, systems, methodologies and processes related to gravity-dependent chemical, physical as well as biological processes.
Similarly to what happens in the field of osteoporosis, muscular atrophy, proprioceptive and neuro-vestibular systems, cardiology and many other research areas, also neurobiology is a research area which can greatly benefit from research campaigns in varying gravity levels as well as in weightlessness: in particular, hormones production and correlated neuro-biological functions are strongly affected by the environment generated by such flight conditions, providing a great deal of experimental results with potentially major implications on the progress in neurobiology.
At the end of 2008, a new SpaceLand research flight campaign in low-gravity and weightlessness was carried out for scientists of the Italian National Health Institute “Istituto Superiore di Sanità” (ISS) together with the Italian National Research Center (CNR) and the European Brain Research Institute (EBRI) - Rita Levi Montalcini Foundation related to the on-going analysis to understand the neurobiological mechanisms which are believed to pay the way to the onset of neurological pathologies such as Alzheimer’s.
In particular, sampling before, during and after the flight campaign was carried out on a group of SpaceLand crewmembers including the world’s youngest life-science test subject (11 years old) flying in so-called Moon-g (1/6 g), Mars-g (1/3 g), Zero-g and hyper-gravity conditions (this latter at approximately 2 g) where g equals 9,81 m/s2 ): the objective was to statistically gather data on quality and quantity of hormones released by humans at different ages when subjected to mental and physical stresses before, during and after aerospace-flight-like situations.
One of the most important SpaceLand research mission in low-gravity and in weightlessness took place in 2008, on September 28th, taking off from the NASA Space Shuttle L.F. at Cape Canaveral, with scientists and test subjects selected among the public and extensively trained to qualify for the flight campaign.
Among them, the 11-year-old Kim Marco was trained and qualified through tests in ground simulators as well as underwater at the SpaceLand Basic Training camp on the Olympic Alps in Italy and then at the SpaceLand Advanced Training Camp in Belgium.
The results show an exponential increase in Kim Marco's neurobiological activity and a major output of neurotrophines in particular the Nerve Growth Factor (NGF, discovered by EBRI-Founder Rita Levi-Montalcini, who won the Nobel Prize for such discovery) with respect to adults: children really look like to be the BEST ASTRONAUTS we might have for the future Moon and Mars Colonies !
Applications for the next educational and research flight by SpaceLand in Lunar & Mars-gravity: please send an email to SpaceLand@SpaceLand.it within mid-February 2009 
