Millie Hughes-Fulford
Millie Elizabeth Hughes-Fulford (December 21, 1945 – February 4, 2021) was an American medical investigator, molecular biologist, and NASA Payload Specialist who flew aboard a NASA Space Shuttle mission.
Millie Hughes-Fulford | |
|---|---|
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| Born | Millie Elizabeth Hughes-Fulford December 21, 1945 Mineral Wells, Texas, U.S. |
| Died | February 4, 2021 (aged 75) |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Tarleton State University, B.S. 1968 Texas Woman's University, Ph.D. 1972 |
| Occupation | Chemist |
| Space career | |
| NASA Payload Specialist | |
Time in space | 9d 02h 14m |
| Missions | STS-40 |
Mission insignia |  |
Background
Hughes-Fulford was born in Mineral Wells, Texas. She graduated from Mineral Wells High School, in 1962, then received her Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry and Biology from Tarleton State University in 1968, and her Ph.D. from Texas Woman's University in 1972. She was widowed and had one daughter named Tori.
She was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Society for Gravitational Science and Biology, American Society for Bone and Mineral Research, American Society for Cell Biology, American Society of Hematology and the Association of Space Explorers.
Academic experience
Hughes-Fulford entered college at the age of 16 and earned her B.Sc. degree in chemistry and biology from Tarleton State University in 1968. In 1968, Dr. Hughes-Fulford began her graduate work studying plasma chemistry at Texas Woman's University as a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow from 1968 to 1971. She was an American Association of University Women Fellow from 1970 to 1971, and a MacArthur Foundation Fellow from 1971 to 1972. Upon completing her doctorate degree at TWU in 1972, Dr. Hughes-Fulford joined the faculty of Southwestern Medical School, The University of Texas at Dallas as a postdoctoral fellow with Marvin D. Siperstein where her research focused on the regulation of cholesterol metabolism.
Dr. Hughes-Fulford contributed over 120 papers and abstracts on bone and cancer growth regulation and on the effect of spaceflight on the immune system at the cell molecular and systems biology level. Since then, she was named the Federal Employee of the Year for the Western Region in 1985, International Zontian in 1992, and Marin County Woman of the Year in 1994. She was a major in the US Army Reserve Medical Corps until 1995.
Selected as a payload specialist by NASA in January 1983, Hughes-Fulford flew in June 1991 aboard STS-40 Spacelab Life Sciences (SLS 1), the first Spacelab mission dedicated to biomedical studies. The SLS-1 mission flew over 3.2 million miles in 146 orbits and its crew completed over 18 experiments during a nine-day period, bringing back more medical data than any previous NASA flight. Mission duration was 218 hours, 14 minutes and 21 seconds, or 9 days, 2 hours, 14 minutes, and 20 seconds.[1][2][3]
Hughes-Fulford was a Professor at the University of California Medical Center at San Francisco where she continued her research until her death in 2021. As the Director of the Hughes-Fulford Laboratory [4] and Scientific Advisor to the Under Secretary of Veteran's Affairs, she studied the control of human prostate cancer growth with VA grants and the regulation of bone and lymphocyte activation with NASA grants.
She was the Principal Investigator (PI) on a series of SpaceHab/Biorack experiments, which examined the regulation of osteoblast (bone cell) growth. These experiments flew on STS-76, in March 1996, STS-81 in January 1997, and STS-84 in May 1997. These studies examined the root causes of osteoporosis that occurs in astronauts during spaceflight. She found changes in anabolic signal transduction in microgravity. Later, in collaboration with Dr. Augusto Cogoli of Zurich, Switzerland, she examined changes in T-cell gene induction in spaceflight in a joint NASA/ESA International Space Station experiment that launched on the Soyuz TMA-9. The previous Leukin experiment with Dr. Cogoli was lost on the STS-107 mission. This study (Leukin) examines the mechanism of action causing the decrease in T-cell activation in microgravity, a medical problem that was first found in returning Apollo astronauts. Isolated T-cells will be activated in spaceflight on Biopack hardware; the altered activation will be examined by reverse-transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RTPCR) analysis of induced genes. Further studies of gene regulation and signal transduction in spaceflight were approved in January 2002 for Shuttle/ISS experiments examining protein kinase C (PKC) signal activation. She flew her most recent experiments to ISS on SpaceX in collaboration with the ISS International Laboratory, the European Space Agency, and the National Institutes of Health. In those studies, she found one basis for changes in the immune system in spaceflight. Many of her publications are available at her lab website.[4]
Awards and honors
- 1995–2005 Organizing Committee for the International Conference on Eicosanoids and other active Bio-lipids
- 1995–2001 Advisory Board for Marine Biological Library Sciences Writing Program, Woods Hole, Mass
- 1994 Marin County Woman of the Year
- 1991 NASA Space Flight Medal
- 1987–1990 she was a member of the Committee on Space Biology and Space Medicine, National Research Council
- 1986–1989 Board of Regents Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach, Florida
- 1984 Presidential Award for Federal Employee for Western Region
- 1971–1972 MacArthur Foundation Fellow
- 1970–1971 American Association of University Women's Fellowship
- 1968–1971 National Science Foundation Fellow (Graduate)
- 1965 National Science Foundation Summer Research Fellow (Undergraduate).
References
- "Payload Specialist Astronaut Bio: Millie Hughes-Fulford (03/2014)". www.jsc.nasa.gov. Archived from the original on June 13, 2018.
- "Spacedu.com - Medical Achievments [sic] in Cell Technology". www.spacedu.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-09. Retrieved 2004-09-03.
- Becker, Joachim. "Astronaut Biography: Millie Hughes-Fulford". www.spacefacts.de.
- "Hughes-Fulford Laboratory". www.hughesfulfordlab.com. Retrieved 2019-04-12.