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Columbus Laboratory
Columbus Laboratory
The science module Columbus is ESA's biggest single contribution to the International Space Station. The 4.5-metre cylindrical module will give an enormous boost to the station's research capabilities. During its 10-year projected lifespan, Earth-based researchers - sometimes with a little help from the ISS crew - will be able to conduct thousands of experiments in life sciences, materials science, fluid physics and a whole host of other disciplines, all in the weightlessness of orbit.

To keep costs low and reliability high, Columbus shares its basic structure and life-support systems with the Italian Space Agency's Multi-Purpose Logistics Modules (MPLM).

But whereas the MPLM is aptly described as a 'space moving van' - albeit a very sophisticated moving van - the 75 cubic metres of space inside Columbus contains an entire suite of science laboratories. The module has room for 10 International Standard Payload Racks, each hosting an entire laboratory in miniature - complete with power and cooling systems, and video and data links to researchers back on Earth.

ESA is developing a range of payload racks, all tailored to squeeze the maximum amount of research from the minimum of space and to offer European scientists across a wide range of disciplines full access to a weightless environment that cannot possibly be duplicated on Earth. The Biolab, for example, supports experiments on micro-organisms, cell and tissue culture, and even small plants and animals. Another rack contains the European Physiology Modules, a set of experiments that will examine how the human body behaves in the absence of gravity. With luck, the results of these could lead to improved treatment for age-related bone loss and other ailments back on Earth. A Material Science Laboratory will investigate solidification physics, notably zero-gravity crystallization, and a Fluid Science Laboratory will accommodate experiments in the strange behaviour of weightless liquids. These too, could bring far-reaching benefits on Earth: better ways to clean up oil spills, for example, and even improved manufacture of optical lenses.

Outside its comfortable, pressurized hull, Columbus has four mounting points for external payloads. Exposed to the vacuum of space, science packages can investigate anything from the ability of bacteria to survive on an artificial meteorite to volcanic activity 400 km below on the Earth.

Columbus in orbit is only the most obvious and impressive part of the whole research programme. Columbus on the ground will involve researchers all over Europe, who will be able to control their own experiments directly from several User Centres or even directly from their workplaces. Their efforts will be channelled through the Columbus Control Centre in Germany, which will interface with the module itself and also ESA's NASA partners in the United States.

Like the Genoese navigator for whom it was named, Columbus is set for a long journey of exploration. But thanks to broadband telecommunications, hundreds - perhaps thousands - of explorers will be able to work aboard during its 10-year mission.

The actual launch date of Columbus is not known at present - it is dependent on the success of the Return to Flight of the Space Shuttle.

Source: Text ESA 2005

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