Troy High School students Dorothy Chen and Sara Ma, who were named winners of the Global YouTube Space Lab Competition in March, will have the opportunity to talk Thursday morning with the astronauts currently carrying out their winning experiment in space.

Chen and Ma, who are both currently in London, will chat with the crew live via YouTube from 10:50-11:30 a.m. while their fellow students and teachers watch the exchange live on YouTube from Troy High School (see attached featured YouTube video or visit youtube.com/spacelab).

Earlier this summer, Chen and Ma traveled to Japan to watch their experiment launch into space. The experiment they designed asks: “Could alien superbugs cure disease on Earth?”

Chen and Ma proposed sending the bacillus subtillis bacteria to the space station to see if introducing different nutrients and compounds – like fertilizer and nitrogen – can block their growth in the hopes of providing new tools to fight germs on Earth (see attached YouTube video).

“The idea that something that is your experiment being sent up into space and actually becoming a reality is incredible,” Ma said in a March press release.

“I definitely want to pursue science as a career,” Chen added.

The pair, now both seniors at Troy High School, also received a visit from Sen. Carl Levin (D-Michigan) in April to congratulate them on their accomplishment.

The contest is sponsored by YouTube, Space Adventures and Lenovo, a global technology company in partnership with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA.) For more information, visit the YouTube Space Lab.