NASA began research and development in 1986 on the Russian space station Mir. Dr. David Wolf, an American astronaut, and medical doctor spent four months on the spacecraft as NASA was experimenting with a microgravity environment in a rotating wall vessel bioreactor for medical breakthroughs. NASA wanted a microgravity weightlessness environment to expand human adult stem cells in a three -dimensional state for the rejuvenation of astronaut’s organs for extended space travel. Since the mid-1980s, every space shuttle mission was equipped with a bioreactor to conduct R&D in outer space. Currently, there are bioreactors today on the international space station doing advanced medical research to better humankind. In early 2000, NASA released this vital technology to the public. Six years later (2007), our scientist started to experiment with the bioreactor.

They used human tissue biomolecules for three-dimensional expansion for cosmetics, thus developing the active ingredient. In late 2011, the European Union banned any human substance for cosmetics. Our scientists had to reformulate the active ingredient, thus transitioning into the green revolution. We sought out the most potent plant with antioxidants and anti-fighting cancer: camellia sinensis, an evergreen shrub or small tree whose leaves and leaf buds are used to produce tea.

According to researchers, the extracts of the green tea leaves have a host of health benefits. Otherwise known as “tea plant,” “tea shrub,” and “tea tree,” it contains a large number of biochemically active compounds called phenolics that include flavonoids that have anti-cancer, anti-oxidant and anti-aging properties. The miracle plant possesses several biological activities such as anti-mutagenic, anti-carcinogenic, antiaging properties.

The miracle plant possesses several biological activities such as anti-mutagenic, anti-carcinogenic, anti-aging, etc. properties. Cell suspension culture is one of the most effective systems to produce secondary metabolites. It is possible to increase the phenolic compounds and tocopherols by using callus, a hard formation of tissue (botany), stem cell suspension cultures. Our scientists asked: Could we get more—and more potent—flavonoids and other active biological ingredients by growing live cells in the NASA-derived bioreactor instead of just extracting dead leaves in alcohol? The answer: Yes, mainly because we made two other improvements. One was to pick a species of green tea, the Chinese mountain tea plant, which grows in a harsh high-altitude environment, and thus needs to make more potent chemicals to protect itself from insects, sunlight, and pathogens. The second was to use a particular type of cell—so-called plant callus derived from somatic cells that undergo dedifferentiation to give rise to totipotent embryogenic cells. These are like stem cells in their ability to regenerate any part of the entire plant.

These specialized cells don’t just make the flavonoids, they also produce growth factors and other proteins and hormone compounds that promote cell regeneration, which is a breakthrough for the cosmetic industry.