SPACE STATION

                                                  SPACE STATION                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                he expansion schedule was interrupted by the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003, with the resulting two year hiatus in the Space Shuttle programme halting station assembly. The space shuttle was grounded until 2005 with STS-114 flown by Discovery.[78]

Assembly resumed in 2006 with the arrival of STS-115 with Atlantis, which delivered the station's second set of solar arrays. Several more truss segments and a third set of arrays were delivered on STS-116, STS-117, and STS-118. As a result of the major expansion of the station's power-generating capabilities, more pressurised modules could be accommodated, and the Harmony node and Columbus European laboratory were added. These were followed shortly after by the first two components of Kibō. In March 2009, STS-119 completed the Integrated Truss Structure with the installation of the fourth and final set of solar arrays. The final section of Kibō was delivered in July 2009 on STS-127, followed by the Russian Poisk module. The third node, Tranquility, was delivered in February 2010 during STS-130 by the Space Shuttle Endeavour, alongside the Cupola, closely followed in May 2010 by the penultimate Russian module, Rassvet. Rassvet was delivered by Space Shuttle Atlantis on STS-132 in exchange for the Russian Proton delivery of the Zarya Module in 1998 which had been funded by the United States. The last pressurised module of the USOS, Leonardo, was brought to the station by Discovery on her final flight, STS-133, followed by the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on STS-134, delivered by Endeavour.[81]


The Cupola arrived in 2010
As of June 2011, the station consisted of fifteen pressurised modules and the Integrated Truss Structure. Still to be launched are the Russian Multipurpose Laboratory Module Nauka and a number of external components, including the European Robotic Arm. Assembly is expected to be completed by April 2014,[needs update] by which point the station will have a mass in excess of 400 tonnes (440 short tons).[3][82]

The gross mass of the station changes over time. The total launch mass of the modules on orbit is about 417,289 kg (919,965 lb) (as of 03/09/2011). The mass of experiments, spare parts, personal effects, crew, foodstuff, clothing, propellants, water supplies, gas supplies, docked spacecraft, and other items add to the total mass of the station. Hydrogen gas is constantly vented overboard by the oxygen generators.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     or Node 1, is one of three nodes, or passive connecting modules, in the US Orbital Segment of the station. It was the first US-built component of the Station to be launched. Cylindrical in shape, with six berthing locations facilitating connections to other modules, Unity was carried into orbit by Space Shuttle Endeavour as the primary cargo of STS-88 in 1998. Essential space station resources such as fluids, environmental control and life support systems, electrical and data systems are routed through Unity to supply work and living areas of the station. More than 50,000 mechanical items, 216 lines to carry fluids and gases, and 121 internal and external electrical cables using six miles of wire were installed in the Unity node. Unity is made of aluminum. Prior to its launch aboard Endeavour, conical Pressurized Mating Adapters (PMAs) were attached to the aft and forward berthing mechanisms of Unity. Unity and the two mating adapters together weighed about 11,600 kg (25,600 lb). The adapters allow the docking systems used by the Space Shuttle and by Russian modules to attach to the node's hatches and berthing mechanisms.

Unity was carried into orbit as the primary cargo of the Space Shuttle Endeavour on STS-88, the first Space Shuttle mission dedicated to assembly of the station. On December 6, 1998, the STS-88 crew mated the aft berthing port of Unity with the forward hatch of the already orbiting Zarya module.                                                                                                                                                                                                                              (Russian: Заря́; lit. dawn), also known as the Functional Cargo Block or FGB (from the Russian "Функционально-грузовой блок", Funktsionalno-gruzovoy blok or ФГБ), was the first module of the International Space Station to be launched. The FGB provided electrical power, storage, propulsion, and guidance to the ISS during the initial stage of assembly. With the launch and assembly in orbit of other modules with more specialized functionality, Zarya is now primarily used for storage, both inside the pressurized section and in the externally mounted fuel tanks. The Zarya is a descendant of the TKS spacecraft designed for the Soviet Salyut program. The name Zarya was given to the FGB because it signified the dawn of a new era of international cooperation in space. Although it was built by a Russian company, it is owned by the United States. Zarya weighs 19,300 kg (42,500 lb), is 12.55 m (41.2 ft) long and 4.1 m (13 ft) wide, discounting solar arrays.

Built from December 1994 to January 1998 in Russia at the Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center (KhSC) in Moscow, Zarya's control system was developed by the Khartron Corp. (Kharkiv, Ukraine).

Zarya was launched on November 20, 1998, on a Russian Proton rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome Site 81 in Kazakhstan to a 400 km (250 mi) high orbit with a designed lifetime of at least 15 years. After Zarya reached orbit, STS-88 launched on December 4, 1998, to attach the Unity Module.

Although only designed to fly autonomously for six to eight months, Zarya did so for almost two years due to delays with the Russian Service Module, Zvezda, which finally launched on July 12, 2000, and docked with Zarya on July 26 using the Russian Kurs docking system.

SPACE STATION

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             SPACE  STATION                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            The assembly of the International Space Station, a major endeavour in space architecture, began in November 1998.^[3] Russian modules launched and docked robotically, with the exception of Rassvet. All other modules were delivered by the Space Shuttle, which required installation by ISS and shuttle crewmembers using the SSRMS and EVAs; as of 5 June 2011, they had added 159 components during more than 1,000 hours of EVA. 127 of these spacewalks originated from the station, while the remaining 32 were launched from the airlocks of docked Space Shuttles. The beta angle of the station had to be considered at all times during construction, as the station's beta angle is directly related to the percentage of its orbit that the station (as well as any docked or docking spacecraft) is exposed to the sun; the Space Shuttle would not perform optimally above a limit called the "beta cutoff".

The first module of the ISS, Zarya, was launched on 20 November 1998 on an autonomous Russian Proton rocket. It provided propulsion, attitude control, communications, electrical power, but lacked long-term life support functions. Two weeks later a passive NASA moduleUnity was launched aboard Space Shuttle flight STS-88 and attached to Zarya by astronauts during EVAs. This module has twoPressurized Mating Adapters (PMAs), one connects permanently to Zarya, the other allows the Space Shuttle to dock to the space station. At this time, the Russian station Mir was still inhabited. The ISS remained unmanned for two years, during which time Mir was de-orbited. On 12 July 2000 Zvezda was launched into orbit. Preprogrammed commands on board deployed its solar arrays and communications antenna. It then became the passive vehicle for a rendezvous with the Zarya and Unity. As a passive "target" vehicle, the Zvezda maintained a stationkeeping orbit as the Zarya-Unity vehicle performed the rendezvous and docking via ground control and the Russian automated rendezvous and docking system. Zarya's computer transferred control of the station to Zvezda's computer soon after docking. Zvezda added sleeping quarters, a toilet, kitchen, CO₂ scrubbers, dehumidifier, oxygen generators, exercise equipment, plus data, voice and television communications with mission control. This enabled permanent habitation of the station

                                                                                                                                                                                                               The first resident crew, Expedition 1, arrived in November 2000 on Soyuz TM-31. At the end of the first day on the station, astronaut Bill Shepherd requested the use of the radio call sign "Alpha", which he and cosmonaut Krikalev preferred to the more cumbersome "International Space Station".^[71] The name "Alpha" had previously been used for the station in the early

1990s,^[72] and following the request, its use was authorised for the whole of Expedition 1.^[73] Shepherd had been advocating the use of a new name to project managers for some time. Referencing a naval tradition in a pre-launch news conference he had said: "For thousands of years, humans have been going to sea in ships. People have designed and built these vessels, launched them with a good feeling that a name will bring good fortune to the crew and success to their voyage."^[74] Yuri Semenov, the President of Russian Space Corporation Energia at the time, disapproved of the name "Alpha"; he felt that Mir was the first space station, and so he would have preferred the names "Beta" or "Mir 2" for the ISS.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              arrived midway between the flights of STS-92 and STS-97. These two Space Shuttle flights each added segments of the station's Integrated Truss Structure, which provided the station with Ku-band communication for US television, additional attitude support needed for the additional mass of the USOS, and substantial solar arrays supplementing the station's existing 4 solar arrays.

Over the next two years the station continued to expand. A Soyuz-U rocket delivered the Pirs docking compartment. The Space Shuttles Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour delivered the Destiny laboratory and Quest airlock, in addition to the station's main robot arm, the Canadarm2, and several more segments of the Integrated Truss Structure.

SPACE STATION

                                               SPACE STATION                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   The ISS crew provides opportunities for students on Earth by running student-developed experiments, making educational demonstrations, allowing for student participation in classroom versions of ISS experiments, and directly engaging students using radio, videolink and email.ESA offers a wide range of free teaching materials that can be downloaded for use in classrooms.

 In one lesson, students can navigate a 3-D model of the interior and exterior of the ISS, and face spontaneous challenges to solve in real time.

JAXA aims both to "Stimulate the curiosity of children, cultivating their spirits, and encouraging their passion to pursue craftsmanship", and to "Heighten the child's awareness of the importance of life and their responsibilities in society.'' Through a series of education guides, a deeper understanding of the past and near-term future of manned space flight, as well as that of Earth and life, will be learned. In the JAXA Seeds in Space experiments, the mutation effects of spaceflight on plant seeds aboard the ISS is explored. Students grow sunflower seeds which flew on the ISS for about nine months as a start to 'touch the Universe'. In the first phase of Kibō utilisation from 2008 to mid-2010, researchers from more than a dozen Japanese universities conducted experiments in diverse fields.

space station

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            SPACE STATION                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         The International Space Station (ISS) is a space station, or a habitable artificial satellite, in low Earth orbit. It is a modular structure whose first component was launched in 1998. Now the largest artificial body in orbit, it can often be seen with the naked eye from Earth.[8] The ISS consists of pressurised modules, external trusses, solar arrays and other components. ISS components have been launched by American Space Shuttles as well as Russian Proton and Soyuz rockets. In 1984, the ESA was invited to participate in Space Station Freedom. After the USSR dissolved, the United States and Russia merged Mir-2 and Freedom together in 1993.

The ISS 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. The station is suited for the testing of spacecraft systems and equipment required for missions to the Moon and Mars. The ISS maintains an orbit with an altitude of between 330 and 435 km (205 and 270 mi) by means of reboost manoeuvres using the engines of the Zvezda module or visiting spacecraft. It completes 15.54 orbits per day.

ISS is the ninth space station to be inhabited by crews, following the Soviet and later Russian Salyut, Almaz, and Mir stations as well as Skylab from the US. The station has been continuously occupied for 14 years and 84 days since the arrival of Expedition 1 on 2 November 2000. This is the longest continuous human presence in space, having surpassed the previous record of 9 years and 357 days held by Mir. The station is serviced by a variety of visiting spacecraft: Soyuz, Progress, the Automated Transfer Vehicle, the H-II Transfer Vehicle, Dragon, and Cygnus. It has been visited by astronauts and cosmonauts from 15 different nations.
After the U.S. Space Shuttle program ended in 2011, Soyuz rockets became the only provider of transport for astronauts at the International Space Station, while Dragon became the only provider of bulk cargo-return-to-Earth services (downmass capability of Soyuz capsules is very limited).

The ISS programme is a joint project among five participating space agencies: NASA, Roscosmos, JAXA, ESA, and CSA.The ownership and use of the space station is established by intergovernmental treaties and agreements. The station is divided into two sections, the Russian Orbital Segment (ROS) and the United States Orbital Segment (USOS), which is shared by many nations. As of January 2014, the US-portion of the ISS was funded until 2024, and may operate until 2028.The Russian Federal Space                                                        Agency, Roskosmos (RKA) has proposed using the ISS to commission modules for a new space station, called OPSEK, before the remainder of the ISS is deorbited. The Russian ISS program head, Alexey B. Krasnov, said in July 2014 that "the Ukraine crisis is why Roscosmos has received no government approval to continue the station partnership beyond 2020                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     According to the original Memorandum of Understanding between NASA and Rosaviakosmos, the International Space Station was intended to be a laboratory, observatory and factory in low Earth orbit. It was also planned to provide transportation, maintenance, and act as a staging base for possible future missions to the Moon, Mars and asteroids. In the 2010 United States National Space Policy, the ISS was given additional roles of serving commercial, diplomatic and educational purposes.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            The ISS provides a platform to conduct scientific research. While small unmanned spacecraft can provide platforms for zero gravity and exposure to space, space stations offer a long term environment where studies can be performed potentially for decades, combined with ready access by human researchers over periods that exceed the capabilities of manned spacecraft.

The Station simplifies individual experiments by eliminating the need for separate rocket launches and research staff. The wide variety of research fields include astrobiology, astronomy, human research including space medicine and life sciences, physical sciences, materials science, space weather, and weather on Earth (meteorology). Scientists on Earth have access to the crew's data and can modify experiments or launch new ones, which are benefits generally unavailable on unmanned spacecraft. Crews fly expeditions of several months duration, providing approximately 160-man-hours a week of labour with a crew of 6.
Kibō is intended to accelerate Japan's progress in science and technology, gain new knowledge and apply it to such fields as industry and medicine.

To detect dark matter and answer other fundamental questions about our universe, engineers and scientists from all over the world built the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS), which NASA compares to the Hubble telescope, and says could not be accommodated on a free flying satellite platform due in part to its power requirements and data bandwidth needs. On 3 April 2013, NASA scientists reported that hints of dark matter may have been detected by the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. According to the scientists, "The first results from the space-borne Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer confirm an unexplained excess of high-energy positrons in Earth-bound cosmic rays.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            The space environment is hostile to life. Unprotected presence in space is characterised by an intense radiation field (consisting primarily of protons and other subatomic charged particles from the solar wind, in addition to cosmic rays), high vacuum, extreme temperatures, and microgravity. Some simple forms of life called extremophiles, including small invertebrates called tardigrades[42] can survive in this environment in an extremely dry state called desiccation.

Medical research improves knowledge about the effects of long-term space exposure on the human body, including muscle atrophy, bone loss, and fluid shift. This data will be used to determine whether lengthy human spaceflight and space colonisation are feasible. As of 2006, data on bone loss and muscular atrophy suggest that there would be a significant risk of fractures and movement problems if astronauts landed on a planet after a lengthy interplanetary cruise, such as the six-month interval required to travel to Mars. Medical studies are conducted aboard the ISS on behalf of the National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI). Prominent among these is the Advanced Diagnostic Ultrasound in Microgravity study in which astronauts perform ultrasound scans under the guidance of remote experts. The study considers the diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions in space. Usually, there is no physician on board the ISS and diagnosis of medical conditions is a challenge. It is anticipated that remotely guided ultrasound scans will have application on Earth in emergency and rural care situations where access to a trained physician is difficult.

SPACE STATION

•                space station                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      A second Skylab unit (Skylab B) was manufactured, as a backup article; due to the high costs of providing launch vehicles, and a desire by NASA to cease Saturn and Apollo operations in time to prepare for the Space Shuttle coming into service, it was never flown. The hull can now be seen in the National Air and Space Museum, in Washington DC, where it is a popular tourist attraction. A number of additional Salyuts were also produced, as backups or as flight articles that werelater canceled.

• The U.S. Space Station Freedom program, which—despite being under development for ten years—was never launched, evolved into the International Space Station, incorporating elements of the also canceled Russian Mir-2 station, which was never constructed.

• Other canceled space station programs included the United States Air Force Manned Orbiting Laboratory project, canceled in 1969, about a year before the first planned test flight; this was unusual in being an explicitly military project, as opposed to the Soviet Almaz program, which was heavily intertwined with—and concealed by—the contemporaneous Salyut program.

• The European Columbus project planned to create a small space station serviced by the Hermes shuttle. It evolved into the ISS Columbus module.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    
• worldwide to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics through amateur radio communications opportunities with the ISS crew. ARISS is an international working group, consisting of delegations from 9 countries including several countries in Europe as well as Japan, Russia, Canada, and the United States. In areas where radio equipment cannot be used, speakerphones connect students to ground stations which then connect the calls to the station.
• 
  
• First Orbit is a feature-length documentary film about Vostok 1, the first manned space flight around the Earth. By matching the orbit of the International Space Station to that of Vostok 1 as closely as possible, in terms of ground path and time of day, documentary filmmaker Christopher Riley and ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli were able to film the view that Yuri Gagarin saw on his pioneering orbital space flight. This new footage was cut together with the original Vostok 1 mission audio recordings sourced from the Russian State Archive. Nespoli, during Expedition 26/27, filmed the majority of the footage for this documentary film, and as a result is credited as its director of photography.[64] The film was streamed through the website firstorbit.org in a global YouTube premiere in 2011, under a free license.
• 
  
• In May 2013, commander Chris Hadfield shot a music video of David Bowie's Space Oddity on board the station; the film was released freely on YouTube. It was the first music video ever to be filmed in space
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

space station

                                                                   space station                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               The core module of the International Space Station was launched in 1998.

The ISS is divided into two main sections, the Russian orbital segment (ROS), and the United States operational segment (USOS).

USOS modules were brought to the station by the Space Shuttle and manually attached to the ISS by crews during EVAs. Connections are made manually for electrical, data, propulsion and cooling fluids. This results in a single piece which is not designed for disassembly.^[7]

The Russian orbital segment's modules are able to launch, fly and dock themselves without human intervention using Proton rockets.^[8]Connections are automatically made for power, data and propulsion fluids and gases. The Russian approach allows assembly of space stations orbiting other worlds in preparation for manned missions. The Nauka module of the ISS will be used in the 12th Russian/Soviet space station, OPSEK, whose main goal is supporting 

manned deep space exploration.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       A space station, also known as an orbital station or an orbital space station, is a spacecraft capable of supporting a crew, which is designed to remain in space (most commonly in low Earth orbit) for an extended period of time and for other spacecraft to dock. A space station is distinguished from other spacecraft used for human spaceflight by lack of major propulsion or landing systems. Instead, other vehicles transport people and cargo to and from the station. As of September 2014 two space stations are in orbit: the International Space Station, which is permanently manned, and China's Tiangong 1 (which successfully launched on September 29, 2011, after its launch was delayed from August), which is unmanned most of the time.^[1][2]Previous stations include the Almaz and Salyut series, Skylab and most recently Mir.
Today's space stations are research platforms, used to study the effects of long-term space flight on the human body as well as to provide platforms for greater number and length of scientific studies than available on other space vehicles. All space stations to date have been designed with the intention of rotating multiple crews, with each crew member staying aboard the station for weeks or months, but rarely more than a year. Since the ill-fated flight of Soyuz 11 to Salyut 1, all manned spaceflight duration records have been set aboard space stations. The duration record for a single spaceflight is 437.7 days, set by Valeriy Polyakov aboard Mirfrom 1994 to 1995. As of 2013, three astronauts have completed single missions of over a year, all aboardMir.                                                                                                                                                                                                                              Unlike previous stations, the Soviet space station Mir had a modular design; a core unit was launched, and additional modules, generally with a specific role, were later added to that. This method allows for greater flexibility in operation, as well as removing the need for a single immensely powerful launch vehicle. Modular stations are also designed from the outset to have their supplies provided by logistical support, which allows for a longer lifetime at the cost of requiring regular support launches.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          The business arrangement for developing and marketing the station was recently clarified by Russian firm Orbital Technologies, who is collaborating to develop the station with the Rocket and Space Technology Corporation Energia (RSC Energia). ^[22]

• Excalibur Almaz, an international company based in the Isle of Man in the British Isles and headed by Arthur Dula, is developing a system integrated by a reusable space vehicle and a space station based on the technology of the Soviet military stations "Almaz".^[23]In this efforts, Excalibur-Almaz is co-working with a Russian corporation with a large tradition in aerospace technology, the military-industrial association "Mashinostroyenia".^[24]

• In December 2011 Boeing proposed using Node 4 as the core of an Exploration Gateway Platform to be constructed at the ISS and relocated via space tug to an Earth-Moon Lagrange point (EML-1 or 2). The purpose of the platform would be to support lunar landing missions with a reusable lunar lander after the first two SLS flights. It would also bypass the need for a L1 propellant depot for lunar missions. Other hardware would include an airlock, an 'international module', and a MPLM based habitat module.^[25]

• In February 2012 Playboy proposed an orbital "space club", in conjunction with Virgin Galactic. Their plans include a restaurant and a zero gravity dance club.^[26]

• India plans to upgrade its ISRO Orbital Vehicle to perform rendezvous and docking after the planned Indian human spaceflight programme.

See also[edit]

Spaceflight portal

• List of space stations
• Kerim Kerimov, lead architect behind earliest space stations
• Lunar outpost
• Lunar space elevator
• Martian outpost
• Propellant depot, future space station complexes may permit spacecraft to refuel
• Rotating wheel space station
• Timeline of Solar System exploration
• List of films featuring space stations

                                                                                                                                                                                                                            A space station is an artificial structure designed for humans to live in outer space. It is distinguished from other manned spacecraft by its lack of major propulsion or landing capabilities—instead, other vehicles are used to transport crew and cargo to and from the station.

So far, only low earth orbit (LEO) stations, also known as orbital stations, have been implemented. These structures have allowed astronauts to live in space for periods of weeks or months, occasionally exceeding a year. The only space station currently in use is the International Space Station, a joint project of several nations.

Space stations have been used for both military and civilian purposes. The last military-use space station was Salyut 5, which was used by the Almaz program of the Soviet Union in 1976 and 1977.

One of the goals of space stations is to study the effects of long-term space flight on the human body. In addition, they provide platforms for larger numbers and longer durations of scientific studies than available on other space vehicles. Since the ill-fated flight of Soyuz 11 to Salyut 1, all manned spaceflight duration records have been set aboard space stations. The duration record of 437.7 days was set by Valeriy Polyakov aboard Mir, from 1994 to 1995. As of 2006, three astronauts have completed single missions of over a year, all aboard Mir.