The unprecedented offering of the 2000 vintage Petrus, an exclusive, world-class red produced from Merlot grapes in the Pomerol wine-growing region of Bordeaux, was announced in London on Wednesday. "This bottle of Petrus 2000 marks a momentous step in the pursuit of developing and gaining a greater understanding of the maturation of wine," Tim Triptree, international director of the auctioneer's wine and spirits department, said in a statement.

Proceeds will go to the private European rocket company Space Cargo Unlimited, which launched 12 bottles of Petrus 2000 on a voyage to the International Space Station in November 2019, part of a series of experiments in viticulture and microgravity. The company said its so-called Mission WISE marked the world's first private applied space research program.

A dozen bottles of Petrus were shuttled back to Earth from the space station in January this year aboard a SpaceX cargo capsule after spending nearly 440 days, or about 186 million miles (300 million km), in orbit. The wine returned to Bordeaux, where a bottle was opened for a blind taste test at the Institute for Wine and Vine Research by a dozen leading connoisseurs, who compared it with controlled samples of the same vintage Petrus that had stayed on Earth.

The experts, including Jane Anson, a writer for the wine magazine Decanter, reported a subtle but clear difference between the two. "From previous experience of this wine, this particular bottle seems more evolved than I would expect from a 21-year-old bottle of Petrus 2000," Decanter quoted Anson as saying.

"It is beautiful and nuanced, with fine tannins and a sense energy." She rated both samples 98 points.

Christie's said it was making available an unopened bottle of the space-aged collection for immediate purchase through its private sales, along with a matching bottle of the original Earth-bound Petrus 2000, plus a decanter, a set of glasses and a corkscrew fashioned from a meteorite. Decanter said Christie's confirmed the offering was expected to fetch a sale price about $1 million. That would be major markup, even by the high-flying standards of one of the world's most prestigious wines.

A single bottle of vintage 2000 Petrus, from a 28-acre estate that produces only about 30,000 bottles a year, would normally run $5,366, and one sold at auction for $51,660 in 2018, according to the wine investment platform Vinovest.