The seven astronauts and cosmonauts that comprise the second half of the Worldwide Area Station’s Expedition 73 crew centered this week on a brand new cargo of provides and conducting the time-sensitive science that arrived together with the cargo. Additionally they ready for an upcoming re-boost of the orbital advanced’s altitude in orbit.
Orbital statement
Earlier than turning into an astronaut, Jonny Kim was a Navy SEAL and a medical physician. Now aboard the Worldwide Area Station, he has revealed he was a gamer, too, and capable of put some his boyhood abilities to good use.
“Rising up, I performed a variety of video video games — and whereas I nonetheless get pleasure from gaming with my children, time is scarcer today,” wrote Kim in a social media publish on Wednesday (Aug. 27). “This demo introduced me proper again, mixing parts of real-time technique, RPGs, and first-person play into one thing very actual.”
Working with the Floor Avatar group on the European Area Company (ESA), Kim was capable of take a look at how teleoperations may very well be of use to future missions on the moon and Mars.
“A joystick and superior robotic arm controller let me mimic finger and wrist actions with precision. A heads-up show stored me knowledgeable with battery ranges, location information, and fast entry to both an AI assistant or floor groups,” he wrote. “I may enlarge a mini-map to see every robotic’s perspective, like a ‘fog of battle’ in technique video games, and ship parallel instructions to totally different items. With the effective arm controls, I may enter into the angle of a humanoid robotic to control the atmosphere, whether or not shifting science samples or shifting a rock that blocked the way in which.”
Kim stated his favourite demo was with a rover that had a smaller, deployable unit that might get into tight areas, equivalent to caves — “a characteristic that felt straight out of a sport however with actual scientific potential.”
“It was not only a know-how demonstration, however a glimpse into how play, creativeness and innovation intersect to form the way forward for exploration,” Kim wrote.
Science standing
Among the many analysis that was performed by the Expedition 73 crew aboard the house station this week was:
MVP Cell-07 — Having arrived aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft on Monday (Aug. 25), one of many house station’s latest science experiments shortly bought the eye of Expedition 73 flight engineer Zena Cardman with NASA. She arrange the Maturation of Vascularized Liver Tissue Assemble in Zero Gravity experiment in a transportable microgravity glovebag to start finding out how the blood vessels in 3D-printed liver tissue reacts to being weightless.
Ultrasound 2 — Kimiya Yui of JAXA and Mike Fincke of NASA labored collectively to check a potential countermeasure to the redistirbution of liquids from the ft to the pinnacle in microgravity. Fincke wore a specifically designed thigh cuff, whereas Yui recorded the info from electrodes utilized to Fincke’s chest.
Station preserving
The Expedition 73 crewmates additionally took half in actions to keep up the house station’s techniques and put together for future analysis.
CRS-33 — NASA astronaut Jonny Kim labored on unloading among the 5,000 kilos (2,300 kilograms) of provides delivered on a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft on Monday (Aug. 25). Fellow flight engineers Mike Fincke and Kimiya Yui eliminated and restowed frozen science samples from Dragon to the freezers on the house station.
NASA engineers at Mission Management in Houston additionally took distant management of the house station’s Candarm2 robotic arm to take away and examine a reboost package that was launched within the unpressurized trunk of SpaceX’s CRS-33 Dragon. The {hardware} will later be used to keep up and lift the orbital advanced’s altitude.
Astronaut exercise
“Boop! We have now a brand new Dragon on the bow of our Worldwide Area Station,” wrote Expedition 73 flight engineer Zena Cardman of NASA in a social media publish on Tuesday (Aug. 26).
The industrial house capsule arrived on the orbiting laboratory on Monday with greater than 5,000 kilos (2,300 kilograms) of provides on board.
“We’ve been laborious at work unpacking ever since. Welcome, SpaceX CRS-33!” wrote Cardman.
By the numbers
As of Friday (Aug. 15), there are 7 folks aboard the Worldwide Area Station: Expedition 73 commander Sergey Ryzhikov of Roscosmos; fellow cosmonauts Alexey Zubritsky and Oleg Platonov; Jonny Kim, Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke of NASA; and Kimiya Yui of JAXA, all flight engineers.
There are two docked crew spacecraft: SpaceX’s Dragon “Endeavour” hooked up to the zenith port of the Concord module and Roscosmos’ Soyuz MS-27 hooked up to the Earth-facing port of the Prichal node.
There are three docked cargo spacecraft: Roscosmos’ Progress MS-30 (91P) hooked up to the aft port of the Zvezda service module, and Progress MS-31 (92P) docked to the space-facing port of the Poisk module. SpaceX’s CRS-33 Dragon spacecraft is docked to the ahead port of Concord Node 2.
As of Friday, the house station has been constantly crewed for 24 years and 9 months and 27 days.
