Bion precursor flights and Bion flights The Soviet biosatellite program began in 1966 with
Kosmos 110, and resumed in 1973 with
Kosmos 605. Cooperation in space ventures between the
Soviet Union and the United States was initiated in 1971, with the signing of the United States and
Soviet Union in Science and Applications Agreement (which included an agreement on space research cooperation). The Soviet Union first offered to fly U.S. experiments on a Kosmos biosatellite in 1974, only a few years after the termination (in 1969) of the
U.S. biosatellite program. The offer was realized in 1975 when the first joint U.S./Soviet research were carried out on the
Kosmos 782 mission. The Bion spacecraft were based on the
Zenit spacecraft and launches began in 1973 with primary emphasis on the problems of radiation effects on human beings. Launches in the program included
Kosmos 110,
605,
690,
782, plus Nauka modules flown on
Zenit-2M reconnaissance satellites. of equipment could be contained in the external Nauka module. The Soviet/Russian Bion program provided U.S. investigators a platform for launching Fundamental Space Biology and biomedical experiments into space. The Bion program, which began in 1966, included a series of missions that flew biological experiments using primates, rodents, insects, cells, and plants on a biosatellite in
near Earth orbit.
NASA became involved in the program in 1975 and participated in 9 of the 11 Bion missions. NASA ended its participation in the program with the
Bion No.11 mission launched in December 1996. The collaboration resulted in the flight of more than 100 U.S. experiments, one-half of all U.S. life sciences flight experiments accomplished with non-human subjects.
Bion-M In 2005, the Bion program was resumed with three new satellites of the modified Bion-M type – the first flight was launched on 19 April 2013 from
Baikonur Cosmodrome,
Kazakhstan. The first satellite of the new series
Bion-M1 featured an aquarium by the
German Aerospace Center (DLR) and carried 45
mice, 18
Mongolian gerbils, 15
geckos,
snails,
fish and
micro-organisms into orbit for 30 days before re-entry and recovery. All the gerbils died due to a hardware failure, but condition of the rest of the experiments, including all geckos, was satisfactory. Half the mice died as was predicted.
Bion-M2 was launched on 20 August 2025 on a
Soyuz 2.1b rocket to an altitude of 380 km. The orbiter carried 75 mice, 1500 fruit flies, and a variety of other small organisms to study how they were affected at the molecular level by space radiation. == Launch history ==