BEAM and Dragon Work, DNA Studies Before Station Lifts Orbit

BEAM and Dragon Work, DNA Studies Before Station Lifts Orbit

Expedition 61 flight engineers practice emergency response skills
Expedition 61 Flight Engineers (clockwise from bottom) Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir of NASA and cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka of Roscosmos brush up on their emergency response skills.

It is back to work for the six-member Expedition 61 crew from the U.S., Russia and Italy after celebrating Christmas aboard the International Space Station. The space residents checked out BEAM and a commercial resupply ship and researched a variety of space phenomena.

NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan opened up the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) today for some housecleaning work. He and fellow NASA Flight Engineer Christina Koch relocated gear stowed in front of BEAM’s hatch and sampled the module’s air and surfaces for microbes. BEAM has been attached to the station since April 2016.

Koch then moved on to loading cargo inside the SpaceX Dragon cargo craft due to return to Earth on January 5. Flight Engineer Jessica Meir started the packing work today as the crew readies research results for splashdown in the Pacific Ocean aboard Dragon.

Meir also explored what microgravity does to genetics sequencing DNA samples with student-designed tools. Next, she ran a combustion experiment and observed how different samples burn and how flames spread in weightlessness.

Commander Luca Parmitano of ESA (European Space Agency) is also gathering hardware for return to Earth inside Dragon. He is packing the obsolete power and electronics gear retrieved during a series of spacewalks earlier this year. Engineers on the ground will analyze how years of exposure to the harsh space environment impacted the devices that powered multiple station systems.

Russia’s docked cargo craft, the Progress 74, will fire its engines twice beginning tonight to lift the station’s orbit to support Russian spacecraft activities in 2020. Cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Skripochka readied the orbital lab today and shuttered windows for the orbital reboost.

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Mark Garcia

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Christmas Week Starts With Biology Research Aboard Orbiting Lab

Christmas Week Starts With Biology Research Aboard Orbiting Lab

The SpaceX Dragon and Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo ships
The SpaceX Dragon and Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo ships are pictured attached to the station as the orbital complex flew above the Laccadive Sea south of India.

The six Expedition 61 crewmembers aboard the International Space Station started Christmas week exploring how weightlessness affects biology. The orbital residents also focused on housekeeping and lab maintenance tasks.

NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan tested a specialized anti-gravity suit today that reverses the upward flow of fluids in humans caused by microgravity. Cosmonaut Alexander Skvortsov attached sensors to Morgan and assisted him into the suit. NASA Flight Engineer Jessica Meir scanned his veins and arteries with an ultrasound device downlinking the data real-time to doctors on the ground.

ESA (European Space Agency) Commander Luca Parmitano and Flight Engineer Christina Koch continued the upkeep of a variety life support hardware and science gear. Parmitano was sampling fluid throughout the station’s thermal control systems to ensure a safe breathing environment. Koch configured air ducts to prevent dust buildup then installed a new combustion experiment that will study how flames spread in space.

Over in the station’s Russian segment, veteran cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka juggled research and life support duties. He first checked on gear collecting data about the station’s external environment of gases and charged particles. Skripochka then logged his meals for a dietary study before turning on sensors recording his cardiac activity.

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Mark Garcia

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