A Commercial Mission Carries Science to the Space Station on This Week @NASA – March 22, 2024

A commercial mission carries science to the space station, highlighting progress in the fight against cancer, and preparing to test new hardware for our Artemis moon rocket – a few of the stories to tell you about, This Week at NASA! On March 21st, an uncrewed SpaceX Dragon spacecraft launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station with scientific investigations and other supplies for the crew aboard the International Space Station. The science being delivered to the station includes a study on plant metabolism in space, new sensors to provide 3-D mapping capabilities for the station's free-flying Astro-V robots, and a study that could benefit solar cell technology. This is SpaceX's 30th Commercial Resupply Services mission to the space station for NASA. During a March 21st event at our headquarters in Washington, NASA and the Department of Health and Human Services highlighted progress the agencies are making toward President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden's Cancer Moonshot Initiative. The initiative has a goal of cutting the nation's cancer death rate by at least 50 percent in the next 25 years. NASA is conducting scientific research on the International Space Station and working with other federal agencies to help end cancer as we know it. A test version of the Universal Stage Adapter for the more powerful version of our space launch system, or SLS rocket, recently was delivered to our Marshall Space Flight Center. The Universal Stage Adapter will connect the rocket's upgraded in-space propulsion stage to the Orion spacecraft as part of the evolved Block 1B configuration of the SLS. The Block 1B, which will debut on Artemis IV, will increase the rocket's payload capability and enable it to send more than 84,000 pounds to the moon in a single launch. Commander for NASA, Gemini and Apollo astronaut Thomas Stafford passed away on March 18. Stafford was critical to the earliest successes of our nation's space program and was instrumental in developing space as a model for international cooperation. He flew on Gemini 6, NASA's first rendezvous in space, commanded Apollo 10, the first flight of the lunar module to the moon, and was commander for NASA's first rendezvous with an international spacecraft on the Apollo-Soyuz mission. Thomas Stafford was 93 years old. That's what's up this week at NASA. For more about what else we're up to, check out nasa.gov.