Milky Way Galaxy

In the early 1980's, the International Space Station was only a paper concept but was touted as NASA's "next logical step" in space exploration. Today, the Space Station is a collaboration of sixteen international partners working together to create a world-class, state-of-the-art orbiting research facility. The Station will afford scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs an unprecedented platform on which to perform complex, long-duration and replicable experiments in the unique environment of space. But, the Space Station is much more than a world-class laboratory; it is an international human experiment - an exciting "city in space" - a place where we will learn how to live and work "off planet."

Chang'e 1

Chang'e 1 is planned to be the first of a series of Chinese missions to the Moon. The spacecraft will launch in late 2007 on a CZ-3A booster and orbit the Moon for a year to test the technology for future missions and to study the lunar environment and surface regolith. The orbiter is based on the DFH-3 Comsat bus and will have a mass of roughly 2000 kg, 150 kg of which will be the scientific payload. The payload will include a stereo camera system to map the lunar surface, an altimeter to measure the distance between the spacecraft and the surface, a gamma/X-ray spectrometer to study the overall composition and radioactive components of the Moon, a microwave radiometer to map the thickness of the lunar regolith, and a system of space environment monitors to collect data on the solar wind and near-lunar region. The Chang'e program is named for a Chinese legend about a young fairy who flies to the Moon.