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2003
Report #33 
4 p.m. CDT, Friday, July 11, 2003 
Mission Control Center, Houston, Texas 
 
The International Space Station's Expedition 7 crewmembers
concentrated on Station upgrades and routine maintenance during their
11th week on orbit. Commander Yuri Malenchenko and NASA ISS Science
Officer Ed Lu also advanced the research in several laboratory
experiments during the week and shared their experiences in both
formal and informal settings. 

In the Russian segment of the Station, Malenchenko installed a
refurbished component of the Satellite Navigation System and new pipe
conduits in the condensate separation and pumping unit; all of that
hardware was delivered to the ISS last month on a Russian resupply
craft. The crewmembers upgraded a relay unit in the Russian audio
system which enables module-to-module "telephone" calls; completed
inspections of life support systems, smoke detectors and microbe
filters throughout the Station; rebuilt and restored laptop computer
hard disk drives; and audited supplies to help mission managers
decide what to launch on upcoming Progress resupply ships. 

The presence of a crew on orbit supplies test subjects for human life
sciences research into how people respond to long periods in the
absence of gravity, and this week Malenchenko and Lu gathered data
for U.S. and Russian experiments gauging their health in
microgravity. They also completed two hours or more of exercise each
day to maintain their muscle tone and cardiovascular fitness. 

Last weekend Lu set up an electronic still camera in the Earth-facing
window of the Destiny Laboratory for another session of the EarthKAM
experiment (Earth Knowledge Acquired by Middle Schools). In this
experiment, students in grades six through eight study Earth
geography and orbital mechanics to understand when Station will be
over a particular spot on Earth, and then submit requests that are
uplinked to the on-board computer that controls the camera. The
students later study the photos "they took" of the Earth from an
altitude of more than 240 miles; more than 300 such photos were taken
during this week's operations. 

Malenchenko and Lu took time throughout the week to share the
experience of ISS. On Monday they used the Station's amateur radio
system to answer questions from participants in the Euro Space Center
Space Camp in Belgium, and sent a message of greeting and
encouragement for a Space Day event at ceremonies commemorating the
65th anniversary of the city of Korolev, home of the Russian Mission
Control Center. Tuesday they chatted with Japanese middle school
students at the "Tokyo FM" Radio Network station, and on
Thursday they discussed the mission with a reporter from the Voice of
America. Today they talked with the winners of a Russian school
science contest. 

Information on the crew's activities aboard the Space Station, future
launch dates, as well as Station sighting opportunities from anywhere
on the Earth, is available on the Internet at: 

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/

Details on Station science operations can be found on an Internet
site administered by the Payload Operations Center at NASA's Marshall
Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., at: 

http://scipoc.msfc.nasa.gov/

The next ISS status report will be issued on Friday, July 18, or
sooner if events warrant. 

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