The International Space Station
What’s the purpose of ISS? The science of tomorrow
ISS has three basic missions. To study the behaviour of the human organism in space over long periods; to carry out a wide range of scientific experiments under Weightlessness" >weightlessness* or microgravity*; to observe Earth as well as the rest of our solar system.
Columbus
© EADS SPACE Transportation
photo Kurt Henseler
Life in space
Maybe you’ve already had to go with a plaster cast after a bad fall. After a few weeks like this you found that your arm or leg had become very thin and incapable of making big efforts. There’s one reason for that: they had stopped being active. It’s a bit similar to the space vacuum: since there is no longer any weight, efforts to do things are much less than on Earth. That causes problems that can sometimes be very troublesome, such as cardio-vascular ones. That in particular will be one of the issues studied by Cardiolab, a Franco-German contribution to the European Physiological Module (EPM), located onboard Columbus. But don’t worry, there will also be an exercise room!
A laboratory in space
In ISS the Weightlessness" >weightlessness will let scientists study a large number of physical, molecular and biological phenomena outside of their usual evolutionary framework on Earth. For example, did you know that a candle’s flame doesn’t have at all the same shape in space? It is Cadmos, created in 1993 by the French National Centre for Space Studies (CNES) that organises and monitors these micro-weight tasks. But there will be many laboratories on board, and even a laboratory, a Japanese one, out in the open, to conduct experiments under solar radiation!
A stepping-stone to the future
ISS will also facilitate observing the Earth, which it circles every 90 minutes. Using the Window Observational Research Facility, a porthole fitted with optical glass, it will be possible to study the movement of continents and atmospheric phenomena. Located 400 km above us, the ISS is also an ideal place to set up a powerful telescope to look extremely far, that is far back in age, in the Universe. And there again, ISS can make us dream from Earth: it is effectively the second brightest object in the starry heavens after the Shepherd’s star, which is none other than a planet, Venus…
