The hatch of the Crew Dragon Freedom capsule has been opened and the astronauts of the Ax-3 mission are on board the Space Station.
The first to enter were Marcus Wandt of the European Space Agency and the first Turkish astronaut Alper Gezeravci, then the Italian Walter Villadei, colonel of the Air Force, and Michael Lopez-Alegria of Axiom Space.
They were welcomed by the Expedition 70 crew, under the command of Andreas Mogensen of ESA.
There are now 11 astronauts of 7 nationalities on the ISS: Denmark with Mogensen, United States with Jasmin Moghbeli, Loral O'Hara and Michael Lopez-Alegria, Russia with Konstantin Borisov, Oleg Kononenko and Nikolai Chub, Japan with Satoshi Furukawa, Italy with Villadei , Sweden with Wandt and Turkey with Gezeravci.
The experiments of the Ax-3 mission
An algorithm and a catalog of debris in orbit for safer space flights, an interactive suit for astronauts, intelligent fabrics and research on neurodegenerative diseases: technology and innovation are the common thread of the 30 experiments of the Axiom-3 mission.
Of the 30 experiments of the mission, 13 are Italian.
It is called Isoc, an acronym for Italian Space Operations Centre, the software developed by the Air Force which provides the updated catalog of space objects and innovative algorithms for space-related events, such as collisions.
Starting tomorrow, after their entry onto the Space Station, Villadei and his colleagues will experience it for the first time in orbit.
The goal is to demonstrate how astronauts could obtain situational analysis in near real time and with limited support from Earth facilities or even autonomously.
It is one of the six experiments managed by the Air Force, which also plays a coordination role for the activities promoted by Italian companies and startups.
On the ISS, astronauts will also experiment with Smart Flight Suit 2, the interactive space suit designed by Spacewear and made with a super-light, breathable, fire-retardant and thermoregulating fabric.
The suit also records numerous medical data from the astronaut.
The fabrics made by the Dallara company are also smart and the Mental Economy startup, with the support of Pwc Italia, is behind the experiment aimed at understanding if and how the microgravity environment can influence cognitive functions.
Studying how much the space environment affects human physiology is the objective of the experiment designed by the Aeronautical and Space Medicine Department of the Air Force, the results of which will help in view of future long-duration space missions.
The project by GVM Assistance, a company involved in digital healthcare, involves real-time monitoring of Villadei's vital parameters with video consultations, in the name of telemedicine.
With the tests on board Ax-3, the Italian Space Agency reaches a total of 83 experiments carried out in orbit since 1997, the year the Memorandum of Understanding with NASA was signed.
Beta-Amyloid Aggregation and Prometeo are the experiments dedicated to neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's, and to the search for new therapies for age-related diseases, while Lidal's goal is to experiment with a new cosmic radiation detection system which, for the first time, will allow astronauts to obtain a real-time assessment of the risk associated with exposure to cosmic radiation during their stay on the Space Station.
Studying female fertility is what the Orion experiment intends to do, which studies the effects of microgravity on the functionality of the ovaries.
Oxidative stress and space environment are linked by the Prometheus II experiment.
Finding molecular signatures of astronaut health is the aim of AstRNAuts, while Nut searches for molecular markers of stress on short-duration space missions.
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