Astronauts Ready For Spacewalk After Health Issues

International Space Station astronauts were quite busy on Sunday getting ready for the first spacewalk since the arrival of the NASA space shuttle Atlantis, which brought with it the European Space Agency module Columbus. The spacewalk had to be delayed due to health issues with German astronaut Hans Schlegel.

Schlegel has been replaced by Stanley Love.

Love and Rex Walheim will perform tasks to get the International Space Statioin and the European Space Agency’s Columbus laboratory ready for installation.

They will have to install the Power Data Grapple Fixture on Columbus, as well as other tasks.

Schlegel and Pilot Alan Poindexter will coordinate the spacewalk from inside the orbiting complex according to NASA.

The European Sapce Agency stated that the current health condition of Schlegel is “not life or mission threatening in any way, but that could affect his efficiency during a spacewalk.”

It is possible that Schlegel will rejoin Rex Walheim for a second spacewalk. NASA has not given any further information though on the matter.

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Shuttle Atlantis docks with space station

U.S. space shuttle Atlantis docked with the International Space Station more than 200 miles

above Earth on Saturday on a mission to deliver Columbus, a $1.9 billion European laboratory.

Columbus, launched aboard Atlantis on Thursday from Florida, was to be lifted by robot arm from the shuttle's payload bay on Sunday and attached to the station, giving Europe its first permanent research facility in space.


Astronauts set for ISS spacewalk

Astronauts aboard the space shuttle Atlantis are preparing for the mission's first spacewalk.
The spacewalk was originally scheduled for Sunday, but had to be delayed by 24 hours after European crew member Hans Schlegel was taken ill.

Mr Schlegel was supposed to venture out into space with US astronaut Rex Walheim, but he will now be replaced.

Atlantis, which docked with the ISS on Saturday, was delivering Europe's Columbus science laboratory.

Mr Schlegel was pulled from the job on Saturday because of illness. The US space agency (Nasa) has refused to elaborate on what was ailing German astronaut Hans Schlegel, but said it was not life-threatening.

Nasa's website said that the medical issue would have "no impact to the overall mission objectives" and that the spacewalk on Monday would be conducted by Rex Walheim and Stan Love, who steps in for Mr Schlegel.

The only difference is who's going out the hatch," said Nasa flight director Mike Sarafin.

Schlegel was said to be looking and sounding well on Sunday, and was expected to take part in the second spacewalk of the mission on Wednesday.

The primary purpose of the spacewalk, which is due to begin at 1430 GMT (0930 EST) is to help install the European space laboratory, Columbus.

Columbus cost about $2bn (£1bn) and has room for three researchers in fields ranging from crop breeding to the development of advanced alloys.

The lab is the first part of the ISS that the European Space Agency (Esa) will control. Installation will now start on Monday.

Routine inspection

Before docking, the crew guided Atlantis in a back-flip manoeuvre that allowed crew on the space station to photograph the shuttle's protective heat-resistant tiles.
Engineers on Earth will check the images for any possible damage that may have been done to the tiles during lift-off.

This became a routine safety measure after the shuttle Columbia disintegrated on re-entering the Earth's atmosphere in 2003.

The 7m-long (24ft), 4.5m-wide (14ft), 12.8-tonne laboratory will be manoeuvred into position by the shuttle's robotic arm, and docked to the station's Harmony Node 2 connector.

Esa astronaut Leopold Eyharts will be staying on the station to commission Columbus, a process that should take a few weeks to complete.

Its installation will mean Esa becomes a full member of the orbital project.

Atlantis was launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Thursday, and is due to return to Earth now on 19 February, a day's extension to the originally planned 11-day mission.

Once the lab is in place, an intensive programme of research in weightless surroundings will begin.

The experiments will also help researchers better understand the physiological demands of long-duration spaceflight, something that will be important if humans are ever to colonise the Moon or travel to Mars.

Development of organic solar cells

The flexible solar module is as small as the page of a book.

Organic Solar Cells:Electricity From A Thin Film
Teams of researchers all over the world are working on the development of organic solar cells. Organic solar cells have good prospects for the future: They can be laid onto thin films, which makes them cheap to produce.
Established printing technologies should be employed for their production of the future. In order to achieve this goal of suitable solar cell architecture as well a coating materials and substrates have to be developed. “This method permits a high throughput, so the greatest cost is that of materials,” says Michael Niggemann, a researcher at ISE.

Nevertheless, organic solar cells are not intended to compete with classic silicon cells – they are not nearly efficient enough to do that just yet. Because they are flexible, however, they can open up new fields of application: Plastic solar cells could supply the power for small mobile devices such as MP3 players or electronic ski passes. Another possibility would be to combine solar cells, sensors and electronic circuits on a small strip of plastic to form a self-sufficient power microsystem.

At nano tech in Tokyo, the Fraunhofer experts will be presenting a flexible solar module that is as small as the page of a book. It was produced by a method that can easily be transferred to roll-to-roll technology – a vital step en route to mass production.

A new design principle helps to save costs, too: Until now, the front electrode, the one that faces the sun, has usually been made of expensive indium tin oxide because this material is transparent. But now there is an alternative: The Fraunhofer crew has interconnected a poorly conductive transparent polymer electrode with a highly conductive metal layer on the rear side of the solar cell. This connection is done trough numerous tiny holes in the solar cell .This has the advantage that a low-priced material can be used. The idea has already been patented.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE in Freiburg is presenting avenues towards industrial mass production at the world’s largest trade fair for nanotechnology, the nano tech 2008 from February 21 through 23 in Tokyo.


Thin-layer Solar Cells May Bring Cheaper Green Power

Scientists are researching new ways of harnessing the sun's rays which could eventually make it cheaper for people to use solar energy to power their homes.
The experts at Durham University are developing light-absorbing materials for use in the production of thin-layer solar photovoltaic (PV) cells which are used to convert light energy into electricity.

The four-year project involves experiments on a range of different materials that would be less expensive and more sustainable to use in the manufacturing of solar panels.

Thicker silicon-based cells and compounds containing indium, a rare and expensive metal, are more commonly used to make solar panels today.

The research, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) SUPERGEN Initiative, focuses on developing thin-layer PV cells using materials such as copper indium diselenide and cadmium telluride.

Right now the project is entering a new phase for the development of cheaper and more sustainable variants of these materials.

The Durham team is also working on manipulating the growth of the materials so they form a continuous structure which is essential for conducting the energy trapped by solar panels before it is turned into usable electricity. This will help improve the efficiency of the thin-layer PV cells.

It's hoped that the development of more affordable thin-film PV cells could lead to a reduction in the cost of solar panels for the domestic market and an increase in the use of solar power.

Solar power currently provides less than one hundredth of one percent of the UK's home energy needs.

The thin-layer PV cells would be used to make solar panels that could be fitted to roofs to help power homes with any surplus electricity being fed back to The National Grid.

This could lead to cheaper fuel bills and less reliance on burning fossil fuels as a way of helping to generate electricity.

Professor Ken Durose, Director of the Durham Centre for Renewable Energy, who is leading the research, said: "One of the main issues in solar energy is the cost of materials and we recognise that the cost of solar cells is slowing down their uptake.

"If solar panels were cheap enough so you could buy a system off the shelf that provided even a fraction of your power needs you would do it, but that product isn't there at the moment.

"The key indicator of cost effectiveness is how many pounds do you have to spend to get a watt of power out?

"If you can make solar panels more cheaply then you will have a winning product."

To aid its research the university has taken delivery of a £1.7 million suite of high powered electron microscopes, funded by the Science Research Investment Fund, which have nano-scale resolution allowing scientists to see the effects that currently limit the performance of solar cells.

One of the microscopes is the first of its kind in the UK and Professor Durose said: "This instrument will put the North East right out in front.

"We are working on new ideas in renewable energy and this opens up tremendous opportunities in research."