ISRO announced on Monday that it, along with the Indian Principal Investigators (PIs), is coordinating with Axiom Space ahead of the Axiom-4 mission’s (AX-4) scheduled launch.

ISRO has shortlisted seven microgravity research experiments proposed by Indian (PIs) from various national R&D laboratories and academic institutions which Group Captain Shukla would be conducting during his 14-day stay at the ISS.

The seven experiments include impact of microgravity radiation in ISS on Edible Microalgae, sprouting salad seeds in space, survival, revival, reproduction and transcriptome of Tardigrades in space, effect of metabolic supplements on muscle regeneration under microgravity, analysing human interaction with electronic displays in microgravity, comparative growth and proteomics responses of cyanobacteria on urea and nitrate in microgravity and impact of microgravity on growth and yield parameters in food crop seeds.

“The experience gained through this effort in implementation of these experiments will nurture a microgravity research ecosystem in the country resulting in the induction of advanced microgravity experiments in various disciplines in the Indian space programme,” ISRO had said earlier while announcing the experiments.

In addition to these seven experiments, ISRO and NASA will be conducting five more experiments which will mainly be on human research programmes which Group Captain Shukla will be participating in.

The mission has been rescheduled four times due to various issues ranging from observation in electrical harness in Crew Dragon Module, delay in preparedness of the Falcon 9 vehicle, unfavourable weather, liquid oxygen leak on Falcon 9 and a snag in the Zvezda service module aboard the ISS.