China's Space Program Thread II
- Thread starter Blitzo
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by78
General
More presentation slides on the two variants of Long March 10. The variant with boosters is intended for China's manned lunar missions. The variant without boosters is for transporting cargo and taikonauts to the Chinese space station, and it has a reusable first stage and has a LEO capacity of 14 tons.
by78
General
The latest on China's manned mission to the moon. The mission is planned for 2030. The manned spacecraft and manned lunar lander will be sent separately on two different LM-10 rockets. The manned spacecraft and the lunar lander will rendezvous and dock in lunar orbit. Once docking is complete, taikonauts are to exit from the manned spacecraft and enter the lunar lander. From there, the lander will descend onto the moon.
The lunar lander is designed to land two taikonauts to the lunar surface. It also carries a lunar roving vehicle weighing 200kg, which is capable of carrying two taikonauts at the same time (the last two images below).
By the way, the lunar spacesuit will provide life support for up to eight hours.
A slide on China's next generation manned spacecraft. It will be used for China's manned lunar mission. From up to bottom, it consists of launch escape tower, return module, and service module. The mass of the space craft is 26 tons. It's designed to carry three taikonauts to lunar orbit and then dock with the lunar lander (see second image below). Also, a new manned spacecraft for near-earth missions will be developed based on this spacecraft and is expected to carry four to seven taikonauts.
A slide on the manned lunar lander. It's mounted on top of a propulsion module that helps it rendezvous and dock with the manned spacecraft (previous slide) in lunar orbit. The lander and propulsion module together weigh 26 tons. The lander itself is equipped with four 7500-Newton engines and can carry two taikonauts + a manned roving vehicle to the lunar surface. The roving vehicle has a 10km range.
by78
General
An illustration of the planned lunar laboratory, as it's currently imagined.
More on this lunar laboratory. It was first unveiled in 2020 (2nd image) and has been in development for sometime (3rd image). It's essentially a large manned lunar rover that serves as a laboratory. This mobile laboratory can accommodate several taikonauts for short periods while they traverse the lunar surface and carry out scientific explorations. In the rear of the vehicle are a pair of EVA suits for extravehicular activities. The mobile lab can operate for very long periods in unmanned mode and with additional modules, it can form a semi-permanent lunar base that can accommodate human activities for extended periods, which is considered an essential intermediate step toward building a permanent lunar base.
The last sentence is interesting, it seems that the LEO variant is somehow a bit ahead of the moon variant. I guess we will see maiden flight of CZ-10A earlier than CZ-10.More presentation slides on the two variants of Long March 10. The variant with boosters is intended for China's manned lunar missions. The variant without boosters is for transporting cargo and taikonauts to the Chinese space station, and it has a reusable first stage and has a LEO capacity of 14 tons.
2023-07-13 09:03:07Global Times Editor : Li Yan
A group of zebrafish may soon be the newest residents in China's space station. The experiment of breeding zebrafish in the space station is mainly to study the interaction between fish and microorganisms in a small closed system, according to Zhang Wei, assistant to the commander-in-chief of the China Manned Space Engineering Space Application System.
As zebrafish are vertebrates, scientists can use them to study bone loss phenomenon, Zhang said at a recent event. Previously, many other organisms include space rice "Xiaowei," arabidopsis thaliana "Xiaonan," and multiple groups of nematodes have already visited the Chinese space station.
Zebrafish, which are small fish measuring between 3 to 4 centimeters in length, are vigorous and can reproduce quickly, with the ability to breed six to seven times a year. The reason zebrafish were selected as space station passengers is due to their high homology with human genes, with a similarity of up to 87 percent.
As model organisms, their physiology, development, and metabolism are highly similar to those of mammals, making them a reliable tool for simulating and predicting human physiology and pathology.
Tiangong has prepared a space home for them - the life ecological science experiment system located in the Wentian lab module. It is a closed "aquarium" with about one liter of water that can breed four to five zebrafish, as well as some algae and microorganisms.
An automatic feeding device has been developed. An intelligent system that monitors fish growth and automatically feeds them was developed and entered space with the launch of the Wentian lab module in 2022.
by78
General
Better images showing the layout of the Hainan Spaceport for Commercial Launches and its associated facilities + two images of current construction progress.
Mr. Shou Junming, the deputy chief engineer of the Hainan Spaceport for Commercial Launches reveals that by 2025, the spaceport is expected to begin launching LOX/methane rockets. The necessary infrastructure and support systems for LOX/methane have been baked into the design of the spaceport.
