A number of garden orb spiders bred by students and teachers at Melbourne's Glen Waverly Secondary College were part of the scientific cargo on board the Columbia.
The experiment was to determine the strength of the spiders' web in space, which may have lead to the creation of man-made spider silk.
Jenni Manning, from Aerospace Education International, says they are awaiting further news from NASA.
"At this stage we are also concerned about the students we have been working with and we just hope that they will be able to get through this," she said.
