Space station

A space station is a artificial satellite in space that people can live at. All past and current space stations have been in low Earth orbit. Space stations can dock with other spacecraft. This allows transferring cargo and people. At present the International Space Station is the only space station in orbit. The first space station was Salyut 1. Prior stations were the seven Salyut stations, Skylab, Mir and the two Tiangong stations.^[1] The Chinese Space Station is planned for the future.^[2]

Space stations are used to learn about how being in space for a long time affects the human body. They also are a place for science experiments and research.^[3] Space stations have been designed for more than one crew. Each crew member may stay aboard the station for weeks or months, and then is replaced by others. Some have spent more than one year at a time on a space station. This includes Vladimir Titov, Musa Manarov, Sergei Avdeyev and Valeriy Polyakov aboard Mir.^[4]

1. ↑ "A history of space stations". Cable News Network. 23 November 1998. Archived from the original on 19 January 2013. Retrieved 25 May 2012.
2. ↑ Xin, Ling (21 April 2021). "China Is Set to Launch First Module of Massive Space Station". Scientific American. Retrieved 26 April 2021.
3. ↑ "Space Stations". Oracle Thinkquest. Archived from the original on 24 February 2014. Retrieved 20 February 2012.
4. ↑ "A History of Manned Space Missions". National Earth Science Teachers Association. Retrieved 4 May 2012.