Space cadet: Citadel grad astronaut Randy Bresnik preps to lift off from Russia – Charleston Post Courier

Randy Bresnik will get a closer look at the August eclipse than anyone back on Earth from 250 miles above the Lowcountry.

Bresnik, a graduate of The Citadel, is scheduled to launch July 28 for the International Space Station, where he'll take over on Sept. 1 as commander of an American-Russian crew. The spacecraft will be positioned just north of Charleston when a relatively rare total solar eclipse occurs Aug. 21.

The crew's job is to continue a few hundred experiments already underway, such as research studying the effects of the craft's micro-gravity on heart stem cells.

But on that August afternoon, Bresnik will be doing the same thing as a lot of people in the world beneath him: shooting photos and video.

"We'll get a different perspective than what you will see, and a different perspective than what the satellites see (from farther out in space)," he said Friday during a brief phone interview from the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia.

The closely monitored and timed interview, conducted with NASA officials breaking in to announce the remaining minutes and then to end it, is a glimpse into Bresnik's daily mission-training life. The interview was one in a series scheduled back-to-back before Bresnik travels Sunday to the takeoff launch site, the Cosmodrome in Baikonur, Kazakhstan.

Star City is a secure location, like a military fort, in the forest near the Chkalovsky Airport on the outskirts of Moscow. Built as its own city, most there have no need to come or go. It looks like a lot of woodsy Southern U.S. military base towns, where the tree-lined homes are modest and the roads turn from asphalt to dirt.

The family of Gagarin, the Russian cosmonaut who was the first human in space, still live there, according to the Daily Mail of London.

Baikonur, about 400 miles to the south, is a village in arid, flat scrubland along the Podstepka River with touristy downtown spots amid rows of Soviet-era low-rise structures. The terrain looks like West Texas. The Cosmodrome sits just to its north, another secure facility in the barren flats.

Bresnik, a 1989 graduate of the Citadel, was a Marine Corps aviator when he became one of 11 members of NASA's Astronaut Class 9 in 2004, a class selected from about 4,000 applicants. He space-walked in 2009 aboard the shuttle Atlantis.

For more than a year, he and other crew members have been in rigorous training for the space station mission in both the United States and Russia, as well as locations in Europe. The training has included Russian language tutoring.

Other training has been done in mock-ups of the station and its array of modules, some underwater to simulate the free float of work outside the spacecraft. A lot of the rest is studying reams of manuals and making responses routine for the crew to the necessary communication needs and other duties.

The current political tension between the U.S. and Russia hasn't spilled into the mission or the camaraderie, Bresnik said. The space station has been a joint mission between the two countries since it was launched in 1998. The technicians and astronauts remain dedicated to the mission.

"Nobody lets any of that (political) stuff get in the way of what we're doing," Bresnik said.

Besnik flew to Russia shortly after a break spending Christmas in Texas with his wife, Rebecca, and two children.

After his 2009 space-walking journey aboard the shuttle Atlantis, he talked about the awe and hard-to-grasp scale of circling the Earth with the sun rising every 90 minutes. The astronauts think of the two-week shuttle missions as a sprint, with so much to be accomplished very quickly.

A space station mission, on the other hand, is a marathon: 180 days aloft, along with "getting uphill and getting back down" in the Soyuz spacecraft.

Besnik said he is looking forward to one perk of life in the station a windowed cupola that juts from the craft and offers views of the universe and the world below. He anticipates spending some quality down time there, watching as he circles the planet.

Reach Bo Petersen Reporter at Facebook, @bopete on Twitter or 1-843-937-5744.

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Space cadet: Citadel grad astronaut Randy Bresnik preps to lift off from Russia - Charleston Post Courier

Cancer-Killing Treatment Tested on International Space Station – Space.com

Microgravity research on the International Space Station may give new insights into fighting cancer, NASA said.

A new investigation in space is trying build a drug to to help the immune system kill cancer cells , which would prevent a given type of cancer from happening again in a patient. Investigators hope to make this possible using a new drug and antibody combination that could decrease the nasty side effects (such as nausea and hair loss) that are common with patients using chemotherapy, NASA officials said in a statement.

While chemotherapy is effective in treating cancer, the treatment unfortunately kills healthy cells along with the unhealthy ones. The new approach targets only cancer cells by combining an antibody with azonafide, a cancer-killing drug. Investigators said they are hopeful that the new combination will cause less severe issues than those associated with chemotherapy, though the treatment will still have side effects. [Benefits of Cancer Research on Space Station Explained (Video)]

New drugs in development on the International Space Station would target cancer cells and cause fewer side effects than chemotherapy. This six-well BioCell will culture the cancer cells.

"One of the reasons cancer cells grow in certain individuals is their defense mechanism fails to recognize" the cancer cells, co-investigator Dhaval Shah, an assistant pharmaceutical sciences professor at SUNY Buffalo in New York state, said in the statement.

"This [new] molecule also has the ability to wake up, or release the brake on existing immune cells within the cancer," Shah added. "In any given tumor, when these molecules are released [from the cancer cell], they 'wake up' the surrounding immune cells and stimulate the body's own immune system, making it recognize and kill the cancer cells itself."

Doing cancer research on the International Space Station provides other benefits as well, he said. The microgravity environment better simulates the human body, because you can grow large, spherical cancer tumors, Zea said.

Also, future explorers heading to Mars are at an increased risk of cancer due to radiation. This research could provide insights into how effective these drug combinations are in microgravity, which would be helpful if the illness happens to occur in astronauts en route to Mars or returning home, NASA stated.

"We don't know if the cells will be metabolizing the drug at the same rate as they do on Earth," said Shah. "In the long term, we need to be sure what drugs are going to work."

The investigation is called "Efficacy and Metabolism of Azonafide Antibody-Drug Conjugates (ADCs) in Microgravity." More information about microgravity investigations can be found @ISS_Research.

Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

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Cancer-Killing Treatment Tested on International Space Station - Space.com

4 Chinese Students to Survive in ‘Space Station’ in Beijing For 200 … – NextShark

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Four willing students in China have signed up to stay within a self-sustaining ecosystem inside two bunkers that simulate life inside a space station for 200 days.

Sealed from the outside world, the participating students from the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics will be involved in a lot of recycling and reusing items ranging from plant cuttings to urine.

The participants entered the Lunar Palace-1 on Sunday and will be living self-sufficiently throughout the duration of the program.According to Reuters, the simulation is aimed to help the students find out more about the conditions of living in a space station on another planet.

The program is part of a bigger project that will be creating a self-sustaining ecosystem that may, in the near future, provide humans the necessities to survive.

The students explained that they happily accepted the challenge as it somehow gets them closer to becoming real astronauts.

Ill get so much out of this, Liu Guanghui, a PhD student, was quoted as saying. Its truly a different life experience.

According to Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics professor and project head Liu Hong, they have carefully calculated every necessary component for human survival.

Weve designed it so the oxygen (produced by plants at the station) is exactly enough to satisfy the humans, the animals, and the organisms that break down the waste materials, she said.

She pointed out that aside from the physical needs, the experiment is also keen on studying the mental impact of being confined in such a limited space for a certain duration of time.

They can become a bit depressed, Liu said. If you spend a long time in this type of environment it can create some psychological problems.

Liu Hui, a student, and participant from the programs initial 60-day experiment at Lunar Palace-1,has reported that she sometimes felt a bit low after working for a day.

As an adjustment, the projects research team designed a specific set of daily tasks for the students to avoid stressing them out.

Part of the new experiment will also test the group how their bodies will react to living a for 200 days without exposure to sunlight.

We did this experiment with animals so we want to see how much impact it will have on people, the professor said.

The Chinese space program, which has been expanding in recent years, is set to probe to the dark side of the moon by next year, with the plan of putting astronauts on the moon by 2036.

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4 Chinese Students to Survive in 'Space Station' in Beijing For 200 ... - NextShark

Students take plunge to build space station | Local News … – Bloomington Pantagraph

NORMAL Maybe elementary and junior high school students can't take a ride on the vomit comet to experience zero gravity. But they can get a taste of how astronauts train for working in micro-gravity in a swimming pool.

That's what 16 students entering sixth- through eighth-grade have been doing this week at Normal Community West High School in the Challenger Learning Center's International Space Station Underwater Adventure. It's part of Heartland Community College's Youth Enrichment Program.

Like the astronauts, the students learn they have to move slowly and carefully as they work to assemble modules that simulate the International Space Station.

It's harder than you think, said 11-year-old Josie Melrose of Bloomington, who will be a sixth-grader at Evans Junior High School this fall. It takes some time to get used to it.

Laura Pulley, 12, of Downs, has wanted to take the class for a couple of years but it wasn't offered last year and she was too young the year before.

I love to explore and learn especially about space, said Laura, who will be a seventh-grader at Tri-Valley. She did a Challenger center mission on a school field trip and said, ever since then, I've wanted to be an astronaut.

The students are using snorkeling equipment and a device similar to scuba equipment called a sea breathe. The sea breathe floats on the surface of the pool and two students at a time wear masks connected to it with hoses, breathing as they would with scuba gear.

Using the sea breathe and learning about scuba techniques, although it is not a scuba class, is the favorite part of the course for Rylan Nelson of Normal. But the 12-year-old, who will be in seventh-grade at Metcalf School, said he also likes learning about space and the International Space Station.

I like how they show us all of the science around it, he said.

But the students are learning more than science and snorkeling.

We will work on teamwork every day, said Shrewsbury.

That happens both in and out of the pool.

For example, they had a group activity where everyone was standing on a space blanket to protect them from the toxic surface of the planet they were on actually a classroom. They had to figure out how to reverse the blanket without losing any of their fellow astronauts.

About a third of the class wound up stepping off the blanket the first day, Shrewsbury said. But, by the second day, their communication and strategy skills improved and no one touched the toxic ground.

Another lesson is the importance of practice and training.

By Day 5, the students will be able to assemble the space station underwater in about an hour but the final task will be preceded by six or seven of practice, explained Shrewsbury.

That's about what it is for astronauts, she said at least six or seven hours of practice for an hourlong spacewalk.

They'll understand it's not just about being an astronaut, but in life it takes time and it takes practice and you have to work as a team, said Shrewsbury.

Josie was confident she and her fellow students would be ready when their parents came to watch.

I think by Friday we'll totally have it mastered, she said.

Mike Burt, a chemistry teacher at Normal West, who also teaches earth and space science, is helping with the class. He said it's a good opportunity to learn more about the Challenger center.

Even though they're just down the street, I had no idea they had all these resources, he said.

Follow Lenore Sobota on Twitter @Pg_Sobota

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Students take plunge to build space station | Local News ... - Bloomington Pantagraph

Bellefonte Area students could get chance to communicate with astronauts in space – Centre Daily Times

Bellefonte Area students could get chance to communicate with astronauts in space
Centre Daily Times
The school is one of 13 in the country to be approved for the second phase of a selection process to host the Earthbound part of amateur radio contact with the International Space Station crew. Representatives from the International Space Station are ...

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Bellefonte Area students could get chance to communicate with astronauts in space - Centre Daily Times

Life on the Moon: China Is Testing a Self-Sustaining Space Station That Could Allow Long-Term Lunar Living – Newsweek

While some nations may be content to simply set foot on the moon, China has bigger things in mind. President Xi Jinping has said he wants his country to become a force in space exploration, and the plan is to start at the celestial body closest to Earth.

China wants to send a probe to the dark side of the moon by next year, and put astronauts on its surface by 2036, Reuters reports. But those astronauts may be staying for a bit longer than Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin: As part of its Lunar Palace 365 project, China is testing a self-sustaining space station that provides inhabitants with everything a person needs to survive, which could lead to extended stays on the moon.

Related: How rocket fuel mined from the moon will get us to Mars

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On Sunday, four students atBeihang Universityin Beijing entered Lunar Palace-1, a 160-square-meterbioregenerative life-support base located in one of the city's suburbs. They replaced a group who lived inside the station for 60 days, but the latest batch of students to call Lunar Palace-1 home will not leave until they've been living self-sufficiently for 200 days."I'll get so much out of this," Liu Guanghui, a Ph.D. studentwho entered the bunker on Sunday,told Reuters. "It's truly a different life experience."

The station's specifications have been meticulously curated. "We've designed it so the oxygen [produced by plants at the station] is exactly enough to satisfy the humans, the animalsand the organisms that break down the waste materials," said Liu Hong, the project's principal architect.

While living in Lunar Palace-1, students will recycle everything from leftover plant matter to their own waste. The latter task may bring to mind the Matt Damoncharacter Mark Watney in the 2015 film The Martian, in which an astronaut was forced to jerry-rig a space station to support him after he was left on Mars. In addition to using his own waste to fertilize plants, Watney had to cope with the psychological toll of being isolated from the outside world. The same is true of the Chinese students testing Lunar Palace-1.

"They can become a bit depressed," Liu Hong said of the students. "If you spend a long time in this type of environment it can create some psychological problems."

Students are given specific daily tasks that help keep their spirits up, but it's difficult to gauge the psychological effect of living in an environment so radically different than what a person is used to. When NASA astronaut Scott Kelly returned from living on the International Space Station for 340 consecutive days, he spoke of how the psychological stress was "harder to quantify and perhaps as damaging" as any physical changes he experienced.

Liu Hui, a student who participated in the initial 60-day experiment at Lunar Palace-1, said she at times"felt a bit low" at the end of the day. The students currently in the station will be there for more than three times as long as Liu Hui, so the psychological effect of a prolonged stay remains to be seen. It's a trick problem, but one that China and the rest of the world will have to negotiate if humanity ever wants to colonize anything outside of the Earth's atmosphere.

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Life on the Moon: China Is Testing a Self-Sustaining Space Station That Could Allow Long-Term Lunar Living - Newsweek

Made In Space to use PEI/PC polymer on International Space Station 3D printing platform – TCT Magazine

Made In Space has revealed it has begun using PEI/PC, a high-performance polymer, in its Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF) on the International Space Station (ISS).

PEI/PC, or polyetherimide/ polycarbonate, is an aerospace-grade polymer that has often been used in aviation and space applications due to its ability to produce strong and heat-resistant materials. Examples of PEI/PC used in additively manufactured parts in aerospace are ULTEM 9085, which has been applied by United Launch Alliance (ULA) among others, and ULTEM 1010, which has been applied by such companies as Eviation Aircraft.

Made In Space already uses ABS (acrylonitrile butadine styrene) and Green PE (polyethylene) in the Additive Manufacturing Facility adopted by NASAs artificial low Earth orbit satellite. PEI/PC represents the third material incorporated into its AMF processes.

Made In Space is proud to add PEI/PC to the suite of materials it is manufacturing in space with, said Andrew Rush, President and CEO of Made In Space. Our team has been regularly printing parts in space with AMF for over a year now. This unparalleled knowledge base of in-space manufacturing operations will enable us to deliver future in-space manufacturing solutions in the most cost effective and efficient ways possible.

With nearly three times the tensile strength of ABS, PEI/PC has been used in the making of satellites and external hardware, as well as in aircraft cabins, and even in medical applications. In 2015, ULA used a PEI/PC material to print a duct for the Environmental Control System of its Atlas V rocket, and just last month, Eviation Aircraft printed a composite lay-up tool in another PEI/PC material.

As well as its use aboard the International Space Station, MIS will look to enhance its Archinaut Development Program with the adoption of the new polymer. Archinaut is Made In Spaces proprietary in-space manufacturing assembly technology, able to build space-optimised portions on spacecraft and satellites. Andrew Rush talked openly with TCT earlier this year about where the company was up to with Archinaut, where he sees it being utilised in the future. The use of PEI/PC will contribute to the technologys development, and is the next step in Made In Spaces ambitions, for Archinaut and for space manufacturing generally.

Manufacturing in PEI/PC really expands the value of in-space manufacturing for human spaceflight, added Rush. PEI/PC is a truly space-capable material. With it, extravehicular activity (EVA) tools and repairs, stronger and more capable intravehicular (IVA) tools, spares, and repairs, and even satellite structure can be created on site, on-demand. That enables safer, less mass-intensive missions and scientific experiments.

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Made In Space to use PEI/PC polymer on International Space Station 3D printing platform - TCT Magazine

Chinese students to live 200 days in sealed space module with nothing going in and nothing coming out – USA TODAY

If you have ever wondered what life on a different planet might be like, it might look a little like this. Susana Victoria Perez (@susana_vp) has more. Buzz60

Student volunteers wave from inside the Lunar Palace 1, a laboratory simulating a lunar-like environment, in Beijing.(Photo: STR, AFP/Getty Images)

They tried it with animals; now its time to try it with humans.

Yes, a group of human guinea pigs actually, four Chinese university students are trying to find out how it feels to live in a self-sustaining space station on another planet.

They are part of a project aimed at creating an ecosystem that provides everything humans need to survive, Reuters reported.

The students, from Beihang University, previously known as the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, entered the Lunar Palace-1 module on Sunday with the aim of living self-sufficiently for 200 days.

The module containsfour bed cubicles, a common room, a washroom, a waste-treatment room and an animal-raising room, according to a report by the official Xinhua News Agency and the People's Daily newspaper.

"I'll get so much out of this," Liu Guanghui, a Ph.D student, who entered the 1,700-square-foot temporary residence on Sunday, told Reuters. "It's truly a different life experience."

Human waste will be treated through a bio-fermentation process, Xinhua reported,and vegetables and other crops will be grown with the help of food and waste byproducts.

The experiment comes as China seeks to become a global power in space exploration, with plans to send the first probe to the dark side of the moon by 2018 and to put astronauts on the moon by 2036, Reuters reported.

Liu Hong, a professor at at the university who is leading the project,said everything needed for human survival had been carefully calculated.

Four student volunteers take an oath before entering the Lunar Palace 1, a laboratory simulating a lunar-like environment.(Photo: STR, AFP/Getty Images)

"We've designed it so the oxygen (produced by plants at the station) is exactly enough to satisfy the humans, the animals and the organisms that break down the waste materials," she told Reuters.

The project also is a test of the psychological impact on humans of a long stay on another planet.

"They can become a bit depressed," Liu told the agency. "If you spend a long time in this type of environment it can create some psychological problems."

The project's support team has found mapping out a specific set of daily tasks for the students is one way that helps them to remain happy, Reuters reported.

"We did this experiment with animals, ... so we want to see how much impact it will have on people," Liusaid.

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Chinese students to live 200 days in sealed space module with nothing going in and nothing coming out - USA TODAY

NanoRacks CEO discusses trends in commercial space hardware – Phys.Org

July 11, 2017 by Tomasz Nowakowski, Astrowatch.net, Universe Today Credit: NanoRacks

Founded in 2009, the Houston, Texas-based company NanoRacks LLC provides commercial hardware and services onboard the International Space Station (ISS) for government and commercial customers. To date, the firm has sent more than 550 payloads from over 30 countries to ISS, creating trends in commercial hardware in space. In an interview with Astrowatch.net, Jeffrey Manber, the founder and CEO of NanoRacks, talks about the company's future and past achievements.

Astrowatch.net: What are you future plans for the company? What is your priority for the coming years?

Jeffrey Manber: We are growing into the world's first commercial space station company. Today, our focus is on completing our commercial airlock on the ISS, which will allow far larger satellites and cargo to be deployed from the station. We are also moving forward on re-use of existing in-space hardware for commercial habitats and marketing other real estate in space, such as Blue Origin's suborbital New Shepard platform. We want to be the market leader in owning or operating as much real estate in space, from low-earth orbit to deep space to the moon and Mars, as is commercially possible.

Astrowatch.net: Your company is involved in many projects onboard the ISS. Could we call NanoRacks a trend setter when it comes to developing commercial hardware on ISS?

Manber: I would like to think that is correct. We were first to market on the station in owning and marketing our own hardware. We were first to have non-U.S. customers, first to have commercial satellite customers using the space station and we paved the way for using the space station in myriad commercial projects, from education to basic research to biopharma.

Astrowatch.net: How is your cooperation with NASA going? Do you plan some projects involving other space agencies?

Manber: Great question. The relationship with NASA has matured in many ways. NASA and the space station program office no longer question whether companies can and should make a profit providing services on the station using their own hardware. The space station office now supports our new projects, such as airlock, where we are self-funding. So the partnership with NASA has matured. They are at times a customer, they are our regulator and they are our landlord. Just as it should be in a commercial relationship!

We have very good relations with other space agencies. ESA is a customer of ours for satellite deployment. So, too, the European Union Commission. We work extensively within the Japanese module KIBO via the U.S.-Japan barter arrangement, so we have wonderful relations with the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and so too with the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), with whom we work on both Progress and Soyuz.

NanoRacks is unusual in how deep is our relations with non U.S. space agencies. This is good as we look to return to the moon and move on to Mars.

Astrowatch.net: Are commercial space companies the future of spaceflight?

Manber: The industry is on the cusp of having space be just another place to do business. We are seeing multiple private launch vehicle efforts, we are seeing government behaving more and more as a customer. We are seeing companies like NanoRacks beginning to look beyond the International Space Station to see a marketplace where there are multiple space stations, all commercial, some unmanned for in-space manufacture, some manned as hotels, some for professionals to train for deep space missions.

Astrowatch.net: Which of NanoRacks' products on ISS is the most important for you and why? Which one was the biggest milestone for your company?

Manber: Right now our satellite deployment hardware is important because it is a large percentage of our current revenue! But as we look to the future, the airlock will be key, because not only will it increase our revenue from today for cargo egress and satellite deployment, but at some point in the future, we will remove the airlock from ISS and attach it to our own commercial platform.

How cool is that? Oh, I would say our biggest milestone was successful deployment of satellites. Or when we agreed to accept NASA funding for a research hardware called Plate Reader and NASA was nervous because we were new. So we agreed that if Plate Reader did not work, we would refund the taxpayers money. Luckily, it all worked! But I have not seen any other company make that same offer when taking the space agency's funding. But it was a turning point for us when NASA realized we were serious.

Astrowatch.net: You have recently made a statement that the company's mission is to democratize access to space. How close to achieving this goal is NanoRacks?

Manber: It is fair to say that after 550 payloads in seven years of operations from over 30 nations, including high schools and new nations to space, that after stimulating the growth of an entire new marketcommercial CubeSatsNanoRacks is today democratizing use of this incredible new frontier. Anyone, anywhere, from China to Vietnam, from Peru to Brooklyn, can and has used NanoRacks to undertake a commercial space research project. We have even had multiple customers whose funding came from crowd sourcing websites. It is a revolution and we are proud to be a leader in realizing this revolution in space utilization. Who knows what will be the situation in just five years?

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One small step for US-China space cooperation – SpaceNews

A Chinese DNA experiment was among the 25 NanoRacks-brokered experiments a SpaceX Dragon delivered to ISS in early June. Credit: NASA

This articleoriginally appeared in the June 19, 2017 issue of SpaceNews magazine.

Collaboration between China and the United States in space is difficult. Federal law prohibits NASA from bilateral cooperation with China unless the agency first receives congressional approval. Export control restrictions prevent U.S. companies from selling hardware to Chinese companies, or launching satellites on Chinese rockets.

One initiative, though, could open the door for greater cooperation between the two space powers, eventually. One of the payloads delivered to the International Space Station on a Dragon cargo spacecraft in early June was an experiment developed by Deng Yulin, a professor at the Beijing Institute of Technology in China. The experiment will test the effects of the space radiation environment on DNA.

The experiment was one of more than 25 brought to the station by NanoRacks, the Houston-based company whose services include delivering and operating experiments on the ISS. What made the experiment stand out was not so much its science or technology but that it was the first Chinese-built experiment to go to the station.

Jeffrey Manber, chief executive of NanoRacks, said the decision to fly the payload was based on business, not politics. Why are we working with China? Because theyre in space, he said during an event in New York June 5, the same day the Dragon berthed to the station.

The experiment flew once before on a Chinese mission, Manber said, with an abnormality detected in the DNA. We dont know yet if its due to the microgravity or the radiation, he said, hence the desire by Deng to fly it again, this time on the ISS.

The experiment was able to navigate a narrow path to overcome legal obstacles to U.S.-China space cooperation. Because the agreement is with NanoRacks, and not NASA, it does not violate existing limitations on bilateral cooperation between NASA and China. Moreover, since the experiment is imported to the United States, it does not run afoul of export control restrictions.

The company, in a June 5 statement, emphasized that the experiment will remain installed on a NanoRacks platform inside the station, with no access to NASA or other ISS systems. There is, NanoRacks added, no transfer of technology between NASA and China. NanoRacks also worked with NASA to ensure there were no issues flying the experiment.

For us, its not about a political statement, but that we now have another unique international customer, Manber said in that statement.

While the flight of that experiment may not have had geopolitical motivations, it might yet have geopolitical implications. In the U.S., the experiment got very little attention until after its launch. However, in China, it was major news, where it was seen as a milestone. This is a new model of cooperation that we can follow in the future, Deng told the state-run Xinhua news agency.

If a Chinese experiment can fly on the ISS, how else could the United States and China cooperate in space? For now, there are no signs of major changes in current U.S. policy, but its clear the issue cannot be ignored, especially as Chinas spaceflight capabilities grow.

Theyre very active, NASA Acting Administrator Robert Lightfoot said at a June 8 hearing of the House Science Committee, when asked about Chinese space capabilities. For us, we have to decide at some point whats going to be our interaction with them.

Manber has his own ideas of how he would like to work with the Chinese in the future. They have a space station as well, he said, and Im going to work as hard as I can to make it international.

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One small step for US-China space cooperation - SpaceNews

The Space Station Fires Music-Playing Satellites Into Orbit – Inverse

A group of five softball-sized satellites have had quite the journey: After a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted them into space, astronauts on the International Space Station received the tiny instruments, and on July 7 they shot them into Earths orbit like cannonballs, whose epic flight is shown in the image below.

These five mini-satellites are cubes, not spheres, and they comprise a fleet of instruments called BIRDS, developed by AMSAT-UK, a private organization that designs, builds, and operates amateur satellites. Their mission, aided by the International Space Station, is to improve radio communications from satellites to the receiving stations used by regular folks down on Earth, aka amateurs.

Each of the five BIRD satellites is identical and built by an international team comprised of five disparate nations Bangladesh, Nigeria, Mongolia, Ghana, and Japan. As the little cubes zip around Earth, the radio operators will try and pass control of the satellites between different ground stations around the globe, with an added game-like component: If the ground stations can successfully send data to the satellites, Earthlings everywhere will be rewarded with space-made music.

To get the music, global researchers will upload digital music data (MIDI files) to the little cubes as they pass overhead, and the satellites themselves will transform the data into music using a vocal simulator. This processed music will then be emanated down to anyone interested in listening to these cosmic sounds. AMSAT-UK provides directions for tuning in here, and says that all one needs is a common hand-held receiver and hand-made Yagi antenna positioned to track the satellite at each given pass over the region.

The International Space Station shoots CubeSats into orbit using a Star Wars-like weapon, the double-barreled JEM Small Satellite Orbital Deployer, which has no malicious or defensive capabilities; it simply fires little cubes into space, sending them to their appropriate locations in Earths orbit.

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The Space Station Fires Music-Playing Satellites Into Orbit - Inverse

China tests self-sustaining space station in Beijing – Reuters

BEIJING Sealed behind the steel doors of two bunkers in a Beijing suburb, university students are trying to find out how it feels to live in a space station on another planet, recycling everything from plant cuttings to urine.

They are part of a project aimed at creating a self-sustaining ecosystem that provides everything humans need to survive.

Four students from Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics entered the Lunar Palace-1 on Sunday with the aim of living self-sufficiently for 200 days.

They say they are happy to act as human guinea-pigs if it means getting closer to their dream of becoming astronauts.

"I'll get so much out of this," Liu Guanghui, a PhD student, who entered the bunker on Sunday, said. "It's truly a different life experience."

President Xi Jinping wants China to become a global power in space exploration, with plans to send the first probe to the dark side of the moon by 2018 and to put astronauts on the moon by 2036. The Lunar Palace 365 experiment may allow them to stay there for extended periods.

For Liu Hong, a professor at Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the project's principal architect, said everything needed for human survival had been carefully calculated.

"We've designed it so the oxygen (produced by plants at the station) is exactly enough to satisfy the humans, the animals, and the organisms that break down the waste materials," she said.

But satisfying physical needs is only one part of the experiment, Liu said. Charting the mental impact of confinement in a small space for such a long time is equally crucial.

"They can become a bit depressed," Liu said. "If you spend a long time in this type of environment it can create some psychological problems."

Liu Hui, a student leader who participated an initial 60-day experiment at Lunar Palace-1 that finished on Sunday, said that she sometimes "felt a bit low" after a day's work.

The project's support team has found mapping out a specific set of daily tasks for the students is one way that helps them to remain happy.

But the 200-day group will also be tested to see how they react to living a for period of time without sunlight. The project's team declined to elaborate.

"We did this experiment with animals... so we want to see how much impact it will have on people," Liu, the professor, said.

(Reporting By Natalie Thomas. Editing by Jane Merriman)

MOUNT ETNA, Italy A robot wheels across a rocky, windswept landscape that looks like the surface of some distant planet from a science fiction film. But it is not in outer space, it's on the slopes of Europe's most active volcano.

BEIJING China's launch of a new heavy-lift rocket, the Long March-5 Y2, carrying what the government said was its heaviest ever satellite, failed on Sunday, official news agency Xinhua said.

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China tests self-sustaining space station in Beijing - Reuters

Plant Life on the International Space Station is Blossoming – Yahoo News

This article originally appeared on The Conversation.

Gravity is a constant for all organisms on Earth. It acts on every aspect of our physiology, behavior and developmentno matter what you are, you evolved in an environment where gravity roots us firmly to the ground.

But what happens if youre removed from that familiar environment and placed into a situation outside your evolutionary experience? Thats exactly the question we ask every day of the plants we growin our laboratory. They start out here in our earthbound lab, but theyre on their way to outer space. What could be a more novel environment for a plant than the zero-gravity conditions of spaceflight?

Trending: Why Police Who Turn Off Their Cams Should Be Punished

By studying how plants react to life in space, we can learn more about how they adapt to environmental changes. Not only are plants crucial to almost every facet of life on Earth; plants will be critical to our explorations of the universe. As we look to a future of possible space colonization, its vital to understand how plants will fare off planet before we rely on them within space outposts to recycle our air and water and supplement our food.

So even while we stay right here on the ground,our research plantsblast off and head to theInternational Space Station(ISS). Already theyve given us some surprises about growing in zero gravityand shaken up some of our thinking about how plants grow on Earth.

international space station

A NASA image shows the International Space Station as it flew over Madagascar, with three of the five spacecraft docked to the station, in this photo taken on April 6, 2016. Tim Peake/ESA/NASA/Handout via Reuters

Learning from Stressed-Out Plants

Plants make especially great research subjects if youre interested in environmental stress. Because theyre stuck in one spotwhat we biologists call sessile organismsplants must cleverly deal in place with whatever their environment throws at them. Moving to a more favorable spot isnt an option, and they can do little to alter the environment around them.

But what they can do is alter their internal environmentand plants are masters of manipulating their metabolism to cope with perturbations of their surroundings. This characteristic is one of the reasons we use plants in our research; we can count on them to be sensitive reporters of environmental change, even in novel environments like spaceflight.

Folks have been curious about how plants respond to spaceflight from the very beginning of our ability to get there. We launchedour first spaceflight experimenton Space Shuttle Columbia back in 1999, and the things we learned then are still fueling new hypotheses about how plants deal with the absence of gravity.

Were in Florida, Our Research Plants Are in Space

Spaceflight requires specialized growth habitats, specialized tools for observation and sample collection, and of course specialized people to take care of the experiment on orbit.

Don't miss: Are Confederate Monuments Our Heritage or Symbols of Hate?

A typical experiment begins on Earth in our lab with the planting of dormant Arabidopsis seeds in Petri plates containing a nutrient gel. This gel (unlike soil) stays put in zero gravity, and provides the water and nutrients the growing plants will need. The plates are then wrapped in dark cloth, taken to Kennedy Space Center, and eventually loaded into the Dragon Capsule on top of a Falcon 9 rocket to catch a ride to the ISS.

Once docked, an astronaut inserts the plates into the plant growth hardware. The light inside stimulates the seeds to sprout, cameras record the growth of the seedlings over time, and at the end of the experiment, the astronaut harvests the 12-day-old plants and save them in tubes of preservative.

Read More

Once returned to us on Earth, we can run more tests on the preserved samples to investigate the unique metabolic processes the plants engaged while on orbit.

Unraveling it Back in the Lab

One of the first things we found was that certain root growth strategies that everyone had assumed need gravity actually dont require it at all.

To seek out water and nutrients, plants need their roots to grow away from where they are planted. On Earth, gravity is the most important cue for the direction to grow, but plants also use touch (think of the root tip as a sensitive fingertip) to help navigate around obstacles.

Back in 1880, Charles Darwin showed that when you grow plants along a slanted surface, the roots dont grow straight away from the seed, but rather take a jog to one side. This root growth strategy is called skewing.Darwin hypothesizedthat a combination of gravity and the root touching its way across the surface was behind itand for 130 years, thats what everyone else thought too.

But in 2010, we saw that the roots of the plants we grew on the ISS marched across the surface of their Petri plate in aperfect example of root skewingno gravity required. It was quite a surprise. So whats really behind root-skewing on orbit, since its obviously not gravity?

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Plants on the ISS do have a potentially second source of information from which they could get a directional cue: light. We hypothesized that in the absence of gravity to point roots away from the direction of the leaves, light plays a bigger role in root guidance.

What we found was that yes, light is important, but not just any light will dothere has to be a gradient of light intensity for it to act as a useful guide. Think of it in terms of a good smell: you can navigate to the kitchen with your eyes closed when cookies are just coming out of the oven, but if the whole house is flooded equally with the scent of chocolate chip cookies, you couldnt find your way.

Adjusting Their Metabolic Toolbox on the Fly

In the absence of gravity, plants cant use the tools theyre used to for navigation, so they had to craft together another solution. They can do that by regulating the way they express their genes. That way they can make more or less of specific proteins that are helpful or not in zero gravity. Various plant parts came up with their own gene regulation strategies.

We found a number of genes involved in making and remodeling cell walls areexpressed differentlyin space-grown plants. Other genes involved with light-sensingnormally expressed in leaves on Earthare expressed in roots on the ISS. In leaves, many genes associated with plant hormone signaling are repressed, and genes associated with insect defense are more active.These same trendsare also seen in the relative abundance of proteins involved in signaling, cell wall metabolism and defense.

These patterns of genes and proteins tell a storyin microgravity, plants respond by loosening their cell walls, along with creating new ways to sense their environment.

We track these gene expression changes in real time by labeling specific proteins with a fluorescent tag. Plants engineered withglowing fluorescent proteinscan then report how they are responding to their environment as it is happening. These engineered plants act as biological sensorsbiosensors for short. Specialized cameras and microscopes let us follow how the plant is utilizing those fluorescent proteins.

Insights from Space

This kind of research gives us new understanding of how plants sense and respond to external stimuli at a fundamental, molecular level. The more we can learn about how plants respond to novel and extreme environments, the more prepared we are for understanding how plants will deal with the changing environments theyre up against here on Earth.

And of course our research will inform collective efforts to take our biology off the planet. The observation that gravity isnt as vital to plants as we once thought is welcome news for the prospect of farming on other planets with low gravity, and even on spacecraft where there is no gravity. Humans are explorers, and when we leave earths orbit, you can bet well take plants with us!

Anna-Lisa Paul is a Research Professor, Graduate Faculty in Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of Florida.

Robert Ferl is the Director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Biotechnology Research, University of Florida.

More from Newsweek

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Plant Life on the International Space Station is Blossoming - Yahoo News

Chinese Space Station Simulation In Beijing Backyard Gets 2nd Set Of Volunteers For 200 Days – International Business Times

Four aspiring Chinese astronauts began an experiment Sunday that will see them spending 200 days inside a space station simulation in a Beijing suburb. Designed to test human survival with limited resources in places far from Earth, the experiment will require the student volunteers to recycle everything from organic and inorganic trash to human waste.

The experiment has been code-named Yuegong-365 and is being conducted at Beihang University in north Beijing, Chinas official news agency Xinhua reported Sunday. Two bunkers have been converted into quarters that replicate living in a space habitat, minus the zero gravity, and the whole set-up is called Yuegong-1 (Lunar Palace-1). That is because the experiment will also test how Chinas Bioregenerative Life Support System works in a moon-like environment. The idea is to develop a self-contained living space for astronauts when, in the future, they travel to and stay on other bodies like the moon or Mars, or wherever else.

Read: Chinas Reliance On Long March 5 Rocket For Its Ambitious Space Program

Volunteers take an oath before entering a simulated space cabin in which they will temporarily live as a part of the scientistic Lunar Palace 365 Project, at Beihang University in Beijing, July 9, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Damir Sagolj

The four volunteers are two men and two women studying at Beihang, which was formerly called Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Liu Hong, a professor at the university who is the principal architect of the project, said all the requirements for human survival had been taken into account.

Weve designed it so the oxygen (produced by plants at the station) is exactly enough to satisfy the humans, the animals, and the organisms that break down the waste materials, she told Reuters.

Other than the physical aspect of the experiment, the mental health and behavior of the volunteers will also be observed, which can be affected by both living in a confined space and the lack of sunlight for such a long period of time.

Liu Hong, chief designer of the Lunar Palace 365 Project stands outside a simulated space cabin in which volunteers temporarily live as a part of the project at Beihang University in Beijing, July 9, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Damir Sagolj

They can become a bit depressed. If you spend a long time in this type of environment it can create some psychological problems. Liu said, and speaking about the lack of sunlight, she added: We did this experiment with animals... so we want to see how much impact it will have on people.

The current batch of volunteers is the second to undergo the experiment, but the first batch was in the facility for a relatively much shorter 60 days. Liu Hui, a participant from the first batch that came out of Yuegong-1 on Sunday, told Reuters that during the experiment, she sometimes felt a bit low after finishing her duties for the day.

But that doesnt seem to have dampened the spirits of the volunteers who entered the over 1700-square-foot-space. Liu Guanghui, a PhD student at Beihang, told Reuters they were happy to participate in the experiment as a way of getting closer to achieving their dreams of being astronauts.

Ill get so much out of this. Its truly a different life experience, she said.

Volunteers smile from inside a simulated space cabin in which they temporarily live as a part of the scientistic Lunar Palace 365 Project, at Beihang University in Beijing, July 9, 2017. Photo: Reuters/Damir Sagolj

The projects team has found assigning a specific set of daily tasks to each volunteer helps keep them busy, and with their minds thus occupied, remain relatively happy.

Read: Chinas First X-Ray Space Telescope To Study Black Holes, Gravitational Waves

China has an ambitious space program that includes a partially complete orbiting space laboratory along the lines of the International Space Station; landing a robotic probe on the far side of the moon in 2018 and a rover on Mars in 2020s; sending crewed missions to the moon; returning lunar samples and studying other planets in the solar system.

However, the indigenously developed rocket on which much of these planned activities depend, the Long March 5, failed its second launch attempt July 2. It did complete a successful launch in November, though.

Read more:

Chinese Space Station Simulation In Beijing Backyard Gets 2nd Set Of Volunteers For 200 Days - International Business Times

Plant Life on the International Space Station is Blossoming – Newsweek

This article originally appeared on The Conversation.

Gravity is a constant for all organisms on Earth. It acts on every aspect of our physiology, behavior and developmentno matter what you are, you evolved in an environment where gravity roots us firmly to the ground.

But what happens if youre removed from that familiar environment and placed into a situation outside your evolutionary experience? Thats exactly the question we ask every day of the plants we growin our laboratory. They start out here in our earthbound lab, but theyre on their way to outer space. What could be a more novel environment for a plant than the zero-gravity conditions of spaceflight?

Daily Emails and Alerts - Get the best of Newsweek delivered to your inbox

By studying how plants react to life in space, we can learn more about how they adapt to environmental changes. Not only are plants crucial to almost every facet of life on Earth; plants will be critical to our explorations of the universe. As we look to a future of possible space colonization, its vital to understand how plants will fare off planet before we rely on them within space outposts to recycle our air and water and supplement our food.

So even while we stay right here on the ground,our research plantsblast off and head to theInternational Space Station(ISS). Already theyve given us some surprises about growing in zero gravityand shaken up some of our thinking about how plants grow on Earth.

A NASA image shows the International Space Station as it flew over Madagascar, with three of the five spacecraft docked to the station, in this photo taken on April 6, 2016. Tim Peake/ESA/NASA/Handout via Reuters

Learning from Stressed-Out Plants

Plants make especially great research subjects if youre interested in environmental stress. Because theyre stuck in one spotwhat we biologists call sessile organismsplants must cleverly deal in place with whatever their environment throws at them. Moving to a more favorable spot isnt an option, and they can do little to alter the environment around them.

But what they can do is alter their internal environmentand plants are masters of manipulating their metabolism to cope with perturbations of their surroundings. This characteristic is one of the reasons we use plants in our research; we can count on them to be sensitive reporters of environmental change, even in novel environments like spaceflight.

Folks have been curious about how plants respond to spaceflight from the very beginning of our ability to get there. We launchedour first spaceflight experimenton Space Shuttle Columbia back in 1999, and the things we learned then are still fueling new hypotheses about how plants deal with the absence of gravity.

Were in Florida, Our Research Plants Are in Space

Spaceflight requires specialized growth habitats, specialized tools for observation and sample collection, and of course specialized people to take care of the experiment on orbit.

A typical experiment begins on Earth in our lab with the planting of dormant Arabidopsis seeds in Petri plates containing a nutrient gel. This gel (unlike soil) stays put in zero gravity, and provides the water and nutrients the growing plants will need. The plates are then wrapped in dark cloth, taken to Kennedy Space Center, and eventually loaded into the Dragon Capsule on top of a Falcon 9 rocket to catch a ride to the ISS.

Once docked, an astronaut inserts the plates into the plant growth hardware. The light inside stimulates the seeds to sprout, cameras record the growth of the seedlings over time, and at the end of the experiment, the astronaut harvests the 12-day-old plants and save them in tubes of preservative.

Once returned to us on Earth, we can run more tests on the preserved samples to investigate the unique metabolic processes the plants engaged while on orbit.

Unraveling it Back in the Lab

One of the first things we found was that certain root growth strategies that everyone had assumed need gravity actually dont require it at all.

To seek out water and nutrients, plants need their roots to grow away from where they are planted. On Earth, gravity is the most important cue for the direction to grow, but plants also use touch (think of the root tip as a sensitive fingertip) to help navigate around obstacles.

Back in 1880, Charles Darwin showed that when you grow plants along a slanted surface, the roots dont grow straight away from the seed, but rather take a jog to one side. This root growth strategy is called skewing.Darwin hypothesizedthat a combination of gravity and the root touching its way across the surface was behind itand for 130 years, thats what everyone else thought too.

But in 2010, we saw that the roots of the plants we grew on the ISS marched across the surface of their Petri plate in aperfect example of root skewingno gravity required. It was quite a surprise. So whats really behind root-skewing on orbit, since its obviously not gravity?

Plants on the ISS do have a potentially second source of information from which they could get a directional cue: light. We hypothesized that in the absence of gravity to point roots away from the direction of the leaves, light plays a bigger role in root guidance.

What we found was that yes, light is important, but not just any light will dothere has to be a gradient of light intensity for it to act as a useful guide. Think of it in terms of a good smell: you can navigate to the kitchen with your eyes closed when cookies are just coming out of the oven, but if the whole house is flooded equally with the scent of chocolate chip cookies, you couldnt find your way.

Adjusting Their Metabolic Toolbox on the Fly

In the absence of gravity, plants cant use the tools theyre used to for navigation, so they had to craft together another solution. They can do that by regulating the way they express their genes. That way they can make more or less of specific proteins that are helpful or not in zero gravity. Various plant parts came up with their own gene regulation strategies.

We found a number of genes involved in making and remodeling cell walls areexpressed differentlyin space-grown plants. Other genes involved with light-sensingnormally expressed in leaves on Earthare expressed in roots on the ISS. In leaves, many genes associated with plant hormone signaling are repressed, and genes associated with insect defense are more active.These same trendsare also seen in the relative abundance of proteins involved in signaling, cell wall metabolism and defense.

These patterns of genes and proteins tell a storyin microgravity, plants respond by loosening their cell walls, along with creating new ways to sense their environment.

We track these gene expression changes in real time by labeling specific proteins with a fluorescent tag. Plants engineered withglowing fluorescent proteinscan then report how they are responding to their environment as it is happening. These engineered plants act as biological sensorsbiosensors for short. Specialized cameras and microscopes let us follow how the plant is utilizing those fluorescent proteins.

Insights from Space

This kind of research gives us new understanding of how plants sense and respond to external stimuli at a fundamental, molecular level. The more we can learn about how plants respond to novel and extreme environments, the more prepared we are for understanding how plants will deal with the changing environments theyre up against here on Earth.

And of course our research will inform collective efforts to take our biology off the planet. The observation that gravity isnt as vital to plants as we once thought is welcome news for the prospect of farming on other planets with low gravity, and even on spacecraft where there is no gravity. Humans are explorers, and when we leave earths orbit, you can bet well take plants with us!

Anna-Lisa Paul is a Research Professor, Graduate Faculty in Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of Florida.

Robert Ferl is the Director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Biotechnology Research, University of Florida.

See original here:

Plant Life on the International Space Station is Blossoming - Newsweek

Ghana enters the space race sending a satellite into orbit – Telegraph.co.uk

Ghana has become the first Sub-Saharan African country to send a satellite into orbit around the earth.

Ghanasat-1 was released from the International Space Station on Friday nearly a month after its launch from the Kennedy Space Centre on Elon Musk's SpaceX flight 11.

Around 400 people burst into applause at the All Nations University in Koforidua, when the satellite began its orbit.

Weighing 1,000 grammes, the Cubesat satellite represents the culmination of a two year project which has cost 40,000.

It is being used to monitor the country's coastline as well as helping Ghana enjoy the full benefits of satellite technology.

The satellite, which was built by students at the college is equipped with low and high-resolution cameras.

It is also fitted with a device which will make it possible to broadcast the country's national anthem and other independence songs from space.

Its progress is also being followed by the JAXA Tsukuba Space Centre in Japan.

Dr Richard Damoah, the product co-ordinator, said it marked a new beginning for the country. "It has opened the door for us to do a lot of activities from space," he told the BBC.

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Ghana enters the space race sending a satellite into orbit - Telegraph.co.uk

Astronauts aboard space station connect with children at Wallingford … – Meriden Record-Journal

WALLINGFORD Aarna Gupta waited patiently among 18 children for her chance to speak to two astronauts aboard the International Space Station.

The Wallingford Public Library hosted a live Skype downlink with NASA astronauts Jack Fischer and Peggy Whitson Thursday, and kids in grades K-5 got to ask them questions.

Gupta, 7, attends CREC Academy of Aerospace and Engineering Elementary School in Rocky Hill. She wanted to know what got them both interested in space to become an astronaut.

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Sunnie Scarpa, head of childrens services, said the event drew more than 200 people, most of whom sat on the floor of the Community Room.

Theres no way we could have fit enough people with chairs, she said. We had a lot of interest.

A live feed played in an adjoining room and in the Collaboratory. The downlink lasted 20 minutes as the ISS drifted over South Carolina toward the Atlantic Ocean.

Kids had submitted questions for the astronauts in the weeks leading up to the event.

The questions the kids came up with were really good ones, Scarpa said. They ask whats important to them.

Fischer and Whitson were energetic and engaging, demonstrating eating, bathing, exercising and even back flips.

What was going through your mind and what were you feeling when you were taking off? Hans-Peter Hansen, 11, asked.

I was just so excited, Fischer said from space. I had flown a lot of cool planes, but nothing with as much thrust as a rocket.

Fischer is a pilot and Air Force colonel.

Hansen said he chose his question because I wanted to know what it felt like to be an astronaut, so he could put himself in their shoes, or more aptly, their spacesuit.

Whats the most interesting thing youve seen and what does it mean to the world? asked Emily Rochniak, 8.

The most interesting thing about being in space, is actually just being in space, Whitson said. This laboratory provides a unique opportunity for scientists to do lots of different kinds of studies that they cant do on Earth.

My mom helped me think of it, Rochniak said of the question, adding she wanted to know what they saw when they looked out the window.

Taryn Casanova, 8, took her question in another direction.

Which questions do you wish people would ask more, and what are the answers to those questions? she asked.

It would be, why is the space station special, Fischer said. Fifteen countries came together to build this place. We have astronauts from all over the world on here.

I couldnt think of anything else, Casanova said of the question, so I decided to ask them what (are) the questions they want people to ask.

When Whitson answered Guptas question about what inspired them to become astronauts, she said the year she graduated high school was the first year NASA picked female astronauts.

That was what inspired me to believe that I could also become an astronaut, she said.

Whitsons answer left Gupta grinning, and with even more questions for her new role model.

One of the questions (I wanted to ask) was, why did they want a girl to do it,? Gupta said.

Whitson became the first female commander of the space station in 2007. In April, she broke the record for most consecutive days in space by a NASA astronaut.

Scarpa said the addition of Whitson to the event, which originally was going to be just with Fischer, was good for all the girls This is something they can aspire to.

LTakores@record-journal.com 203-317-2212 Twitter: @LCTakores

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Astronauts aboard space station connect with children at Wallingford ... - Meriden Record-Journal

Early birds can see space station for next five days – The San Diego … – The San Diego Union-Tribune

If youre an early riser, youll have an opportunity to watch the International Space Station fly over Southern California before dawn each of the next five days starting before dawn on Friday, NASA said.

Heres the viewing schedule for San Diego County:

Friday, July 7, 4:50 a.m.: ISS will be visibe for 4 minutes, initially appearing 23 degrees above the east-northeast horizon.

Saturday, July 8, 3:59 a.m.: ISS will be visible for 2 minutes, initially appearing 26 degrees above the northwest.

Sunday, July 3, 3:09 a.m.: ISS will be visible for about one minute, initially appearing 21 degrees above the north-northeast.

Monday, July 10, 3:51 a.m.: ISS will be visible for about 2 minutes, initially appearing 12 degrees above the northwest.

Tuesday, July 11, 3 a.m.: ISS will be visible for one minute, initially appearing 15 degrees above the north.

Twitter: @grobbins

gary.robbins@sduniontribune.com

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Early birds can see space station for next five days - The San Diego ... - The San Diego Union-Tribune

Photos: Spotting the International Space Station – Deseret News

Spenser Heaps, Deseret News

This composite of seven images taken in less than one second shows the International Space Station in silhouette against the sun as it passes above the Deseret News' office in Salt Lake City on Thursday, July 6, 2017.

This composite of seven images taken in less than one second shows the International Space Station in silhouette against the sun as it passes above the Deseret News' office in Salt Lake City on Thursday. According to NASA, the station is the largest human made object ever to orbit the Earth. It measures 357 feet end to end, which is almost the length of a football field including the end zones, and weighs almost a million pounds. The station serves as a microgravity and space environment research laboratory in which crew members conduct experiments in biology, human biology, physics, astronomy, meteorology and other fields. It completes 15.54 orbits per day. The station's first component was launched into low-Earth orbit in 1998, and it can often be seen with the naked eye. Several times a week, Mission Control at NASAs Johnson Space Center in Houston determines sighting opportunities for more than 6,700 locations worldwide. To look up viewing times log on to spotthestation.nasa.gov.

See the world through the eyes of award-winning photojournalists. Click through the gallery above to view the unique images our visual storytellers captured today. Don't forget to follow the official Deseret News Instagram account for more photographs and videos from the staff.

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Photos: Spotting the International Space Station - Deseret News

Pence Calls for Return to the Moon, Boots on Mars – Space.com

Vice President Mike Pence addresses NASA employees on Thursday, July 6, 2017, at the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. The Trump administration will seek a heavier emphasis on human-spaceflight efforts, including crewed missions to the moon and Mars, Vice President Mike Pence said today (July 6).

During a 25-minute speech at NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC) here on Florida's Space Coast, Pence told the 700-plus members of the crowd that the United States is "at the dawn of a new era of space exploration," and called for a return to the moon and "American boots on the face of Mars." He also said the United States will maintain a presence in low-Earth orbit.

Pence standing on a flag-draped podium in KSC's cavernous Vehicle Assembly Building offered no time frame or budget for the expeditions, but said partnerships with commercial companies are key. He repeatedly called for a "re-establishment" of American leadership in space and made no mention of ongoing or future international partnerships or collaborations, such as the International Space Station, a $100 billion project of 15 nations. [The First 100 Days: What Trump Has Done on Space So Far]

Pence chairs the newly revived National Space Council, which will advise the White House on space policy. The council will begin its work with an initial meeting before the end of the summer, the vice president said today.

Pence also stressed that President Donald Trump's initiatives in space will extend well beyond NASA, though the heart of the program will be human spaceflight and exploration.

"President Trump's vision for space is much larger than NASA alone," Pence said, adding that the National Space Council will coordinate policy among several federal agencies and interests, including the military and commercial sectors.

Echoing Trump's "America first" theme, Pence said Trump intended to carry nationalism into space with renewed emphasis on human space exploration and discovery "for the benefit of the American people and all of the world."

"America will lead in space once again," Pence said.

The United States already has the biggest budget for space exploration, according to a 2016 World Economic Forum report.

"From the first moon landing to the International Space Station, the U.S. government agency NASA has been leading space exploration since its creation in 1958," the report states.

Trump's budget request for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1 drops the Obama Administration's plan to send astronauts to an asteroid as a steppingstone to Mars, but maintains the program's multibillion-dollar, heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and deep-space Orion capsule. The Trump administration's budget request also continues previous program funding for NASA's commercial partnerships with SpaceX, Boeing and other companies.

Since the end of the shuttle program in 2011, the United States has been dependent on Russia to fly crews to and from the space station, which flies about 250 miles (400 kilometers) above Earth. NASA hopes to turn over crew ferry flights to SpaceX and Boeing before the end of 2018.

Editor's Note:Space.com senior producerSteve Spaletacontributed to this report.

Irene Klotz can be reached on Twitter at @free_space. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebookor Google+. Originally published onSpace.com.

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Pence Calls for Return to the Moon, Boots on Mars - Space.com