Scientific Research
For over 50 years, Leidos has supported astronauts, spaceflight, and space science, helping to address known and unknown challenges, evaluating countermeasures to known human space flight risks, and identifying and investigating new risks.
Leidos is at the center of NASA Space Research Program research and ISS Operations as we help enable astronauts to be healthy and successful during space missions, both now and as they progress to flying on new space platforms.
Leidos contributes to advancing astronaut health and capabilities in each of the areas highlighted above ranging from pre-flight crew training, hardware development and payload integration all the way through detailed post-flight activities including data collection, sample/data dissemination and research data archival.
Our team also supports numerous space flight ground analogs and their associated mission operations similarly.
- Leidos coordinates pre-flight biomedical data collection, amassing over 22,000 hours of testing for 70+ completed ISS experiments and 21 ongoing experiments.
- With over 1,100 PhD-holding employees and 50 distinguished technical fellows, we bring a wealth of scientific expertise.
- Our team of 400+ research professionals–including epidemiologists, statisticians, psychologists, physiologists, neuroscientists, clinical researchers, and engineers–conduct crucial research that advances human health, performance, and readiness.
Capabilities
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Space craft radiation analysis What we do today
- Guarding–Assessing–Informing–Mitigating Risks
- Guarding against exposure
- Operate the on call 24/7 radiation console for the ISS and for Artemis 1 Mission with NASA Flight Control Team
- Work with NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center and GFSC Moon-to-Mars Office
- Assessing–Informing–Mitigating
- Provide radiation instruments, data analysis, and environmental characterization to assess, inform and mitigate crew risks associated with space radiation
- Monitored radiation activities for over 300 Space Extra-Vehicular; generated 1,200 Astronaut Radiation Dosimetry reports
- Guarding against exposure
Radiation console operations How we enable tomorrow
- Prepare for future missions (Gateway, Human Landing Systems, EVA Suits, Lunar Surface Mobility)
- Characterizing the radiation environment, developing concepts of operation and instrumentation
- Improving space weather forecast models (with academia)
- Assessing deep space radiation cancer risks (with Oakridge Center for Risk Analysis)
- Guarding–Assessing–Informing–Mitigating Risks
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Orion cockpit man/machine evaluation and analysis What we do today
- At the intersection of science and engineering, Leidos provides human factors and human system integration experts – including three Leidos Technical Fellows - to ensure safe, effective, and efficient human-machine interfaces.
- Leidos human factors engineers employ an astronaut-centric design approach to spacecraft to enable the success of human operators executing research on-orbit. For example, experts in lighting system management tailor systems to ensure crew quarters are properly illuminated for tasks and living.
- Food scientists at Leidos lead the world in testing, preparing, and packaging nutritious and delicious foods for the spaceflight environment, keeping space crews gratified and productive.
Analog testing of lighting and crew procedures for future lunar missions How we enable tomorrow
- Leidos human factors SMEs are actively evaluating and providing specific recommendations to the developers of NASA and commercial space craft, including ways to help optimize human performance.
- At the intersection of science and engineering, Leidos provides human factors and human system integration experts – including three Leidos Technical Fellows - to ensure safe, effective, and efficient human-machine interfaces.
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Leidos lead the development, integration, and installation of the ISS Treadmill 2 What we do today
- Keeping the crew healthy - Maintaining fitness
- Develop and assess medical standards, exercise devices, vehicle and spacesuit requirements, and countermeasures, using our biomedical expertise
- Develop and assess physiologic adaptation devices for ground-based studies
- Provide expert technical solutions, guidance, and support
- Help with weightless physical fitness, operation of medical and research equipment, study-unique hardware/software, and training protocols
The Total Organic Carbon analyzer measures air and water quality on board the ISS How we enable tomorrow
- Use our immediately accessible research analog (our Navy sailor health research) for low-risk insights into human factors and countermeasure inspiration
- Design simple, effective exercise machines—essential for long-duration, deep-space missions, where replacement parts are few and crew performs all maintenance
- Keeping the crew healthy - Maintaining fitness
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Human Research Facility onboard the ISS What we do today
- Providing knowledge and insight, from defining requirements, to integrating spaceflight systems, to delivering the data
- Keeping experiments running
- Support on-orbit research, on console, through the JSC Telescience Support Center
- Supported 20,000 hours of on-orbit research on the ISS—73 ISS biomedical experiments; 89 Principal Investigators
- Keeping experiments running
- Finding the subjects—Recruiting participants for research and NASA studies
- 24/7 support—Providing on-mission support through a 24/7 Mission Control Center for NASA’s Human Exploration Research Analog
NASA’s Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) How we enable tomorrow
- Knowing what’s ahead—Use virtual reality for training, remote support, and simulation—easily adaptable for deep space support
- Watching over their health—Building earth-analogs for submariners to study wellness, psychological factors, and undersea warfighter health and performance, working with the Naval Submarine Medical Research Laboratory
- Seeing the details
- Provide unique insight into astronaut-centric and analogous environments, using our sensor technology
- Autonomous operations and submarine design (through our Maritime group and Gibbs & Cox subsidiary)
- Providing knowledge and insight, from defining requirements, to integrating spaceflight systems, to delivering the data
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FNLCR Campus in Frederick, Maryland What we do today
- Illuminating cancer and other health risks
- Investigating and experimenting
- Implemented 73 space-centered biomedical investigations
- Support 21 ongoing investigations to address risks to human spaceflight
- Investigating and experimenting
- Analyzing the information
- Delivered the Information Management Platform for Data Analytics and Aggregation (IMPALA) for the NASA Human Health and Performance Directorate
- Linking the studies to find a cure
- Support researchers from the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research (FNLCR) and leverage the ISS National Lab
- Crystalize a protein linking to several of the deadliest cancers, including pancreatic, lung, and colon cancers
NASA Twins Study comparing space vs ground base research results on identical twins with a focus on genomic changes How we enable tomorrow
- Reinventing diagnostics
- Developed technology to represent organs digitally (digital twining) with a team of over 1,000 researchers at FNLCR
- Leverage for future spaceflight diagnostics
- Developed technology to represent organs digitally (digital twining) with a team of over 1,000 researchers at FNLCR
- Addressing health in remote environments
- Provide access to over 12,000 medical partners nation-wide to support astronaut health examinations and diagnostic testing with our mobile clinics (through our QTC subsidiary)
- Provide accurate health records and liberate clinician time and money through our electronic health record system (DoD GENESIS)
- Illuminating cancer and other health risks
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What we do today
- Manage laboratories and facilities through our NASA JSC HHPC team
- Feeding the crew—Research, develop, and provide food on the ISS and future deep Space Missions (NASA Space Food Research Laboratory)
- Training—Train the crew for biomedical space flight research in an ISS mockup facility (NASA Human Research Program Payload Development Laboratory)
- Lowering radiation risk—Develop and produce radiation monitoring devices (NASA Space Radiation Hardware Laboratory)
- Sound Engineering—Study spaceflight hardware acoustics (NASA Acoustics Laboratory)
- Collecting samples—Provide space hardware and kits to collect blood, urine, and fecal samples in space and Earthside data analysis (Metabolic Laboratory)
NHRL Campus, San Diego How we enable tomorrow
- Supporting drug discovery and development—Produce pharmaceuticals for first-in-human clinical trials
- Protecting the astronaut—building and deploying a Personal Protection Biosystem that lets pathogens out of a protective suit, and preventing them from coming in
- Manage laboratories and facilities through our NASA JSC HHPC team
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What we do today
Astronaut Christina Koch places blood samples into MELFI freezer for future return to Earth for analysis - Coordinated 22,000+ hours of post-flight biomedical data collection for 70+ completed ISS biomedical experiments
- Also completed recovery, handling, and distribution of 5,000+ samples for those same 70+ ISS biomedical experiments
- After validating the integrity of both the experiments and the corresponding data, we expedite the transfer of all materials to the PIs to enable post-flight analytics.
- Disseminate shared research data to ISS biomedical researchers and select data to NASA Flight Surgeons
How we enable tomorrow
Astronauts return from space and begin post-flight biomedical baseline data collection the same day - Lessons learned routine after each mission provides a robust library for reference as new missions and experiments are conceived and designed
- Our team of 400+ research personnel including epidemiologists, statisticians, psychologists, physiologists, neuroscientists, biomechanists, clinical researchers, and engineers conduct human subject research and data-driven research to drive decision making and improve the health, performance, and readiness of our nation’s warfighters that readily extends to the astronaut.
- Coordinated 22,000+ hours of post-flight biomedical data collection for 70+ completed ISS biomedical experiments
