International Space Station (ISS) - Columbus

The International Space Station (ISS) offers a broad variety of facilities to perform human medical research. Currently the ISS host a permanent crew of 3 astronauts rotating with the Soyuz vehicle every six months. During their 6 months stay the crew receives the regular visit of progress vehicles for the re-supply of food, water, and other consumables, as well as the visit of Shuttle flights programmed for the completion of the building of the space station. Columbus, Europe’s main contribution to ISS, is one of its research modules. It can accommodate up to 10 international standard payload racks and is equipped with 4 external payload facilities. The latest announcement of opportunity to conduct research in the ISS was in 2004.