Sunita Williams returns to earth .. What is International Space Station (for youg learners)

International Space Station (ISS)

What is the International Space Station?

It is a huge man-made platform moving around the earth. It is of the size of a football field. Total weight of this platform is around 344 tons. It has large solar panels to absorb sunlight and convert it to electrical power needed by the ISS. The platform can accommodate about seven human beings who can live there for months together and do their work.
The ISS moves around the earth in a relatively low orbit. Because of its giant size and the smaller distance from the earth’s surface, one can, at times, see the ISS by naked eye , if the sky is clear.

What is the main aim of the ISS?

Man wants to learn many things about the universe, the planets, stars, galaxies etc. From the earth’s surface we can do the viewing, and analyze our findings, but such observation from earth’s surface is limited in scope. The earth’s atmosphere has clouds and dust particles. These blur our vision. Earth has its own magnetic field. Observing the magnetic influence of other heavenly bodies like the plants and stars gets distorted due to the influence of earth’s strong magnetic field. Apart from all these, knowing the effect of weightlessness on our body and those of plants and animals can’t be done unless researchers actually live in a weightless and gravity-less environment for sufficiently long duration. Our bones and muscles will deteriorate if they remain idle or do very less physical activity daily. But by how much will they deteriorate? How to avoid the ruinous effect of zero gravity on living beings of earth? These are important questions space engineers need to answer before sending a man on an extended space voyage.

A prolonged stay in the ISS helps us to understand this unknown science. Then there is the question of studying the radiations coming out of different celestial bodies in the universe. On earth, we receive some of them, but not all. Some radiations are so weak that we can’t analyze them properly. By keeping well-trained scientists and good recording instruments on board the ISS, we can capture radiations, images and a host of other strange things happening in space.

The ISS is not only a living quarter for scientists far above the earth, but also a huge research laboratory with sophisticated instruments.

Who built them and when?

The ISS is an excellent example of the way countries with different ideologies and strengths can cooperate to study the universe. No single nation has the money, man power and technical knowledge to put such a 344-ton high-tech research lab in space.
As many as sixteen nations have pulled their resources to build this giant station. Piece by piece, the components of this facility were designed and manufactured in different factories in different countries. They were then transported piece by piece to space to a designated place and assembled there.

The work started in 1998, and will be fully complete in 2011. Hundreds of flights of the American Discovery space shuttle and the Russian Soyuz rocket have been conducted to ferry these components and human beings to build the space station.

The sixteen participating countries are America, Russia, Japan, Canda and eleven members of the European Space Agency (the United States of America, Russian Federation, Japan, Canada and eleven member states of the European Space Agency (Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom).

How long the human beings stay there, and how do they come back?

Research scientists and flight engineers have spent months at a time on board the ISS. Even some space tourists have gone there to spend a few days in zero-gravity conditions.
These tourists pay huge amount of money for their trips. The Russians have an exclusive section on board the ISS. The tourists spend their space holiday there. So their money is pocketed by the Russians.

The Americans dislike the idea of allowing members of the general public to visit the ISS, possibly out of safety considerations. So they request the Russians not to allow the tourists to trespass into their section.

The re-usable space shuttles of NASA were the main transporters of goods, food stuff and astronauts to the ISS. The Russian Soyuz rockets with lesser carrying capacity also made many trips to do the to and fro transportation job.

However, the Discovery space shuttle vehicles have become old and obsolete. There have been a number of ghastly accidents in these space shuttles. So these vehicles will not fly anymore. Their place will be taken over by a completely new design vehicle. It may take years for NASA to perfect the design, make it and fly it to the ISS. Till then the ISS scientists will be completely dependent on the Russian Soyuz rockets.

Last year, the Discovery space shuttle made its last journey.

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