Three taikonauts of Shenzhou-19 crew enter China Space Station
China Space Station on Wednesday welcomed the arrival of the new batch of residents - the youngest-ever crew comprising of Shenzhou-19 mission commander Cai Xuzhe and new taikonaut Song Lingdong and female taikonaut Wang Haoze, both of whom were born in 1990, at 12:51 pm, after the manned spacecraft successfully docked with the space station combination at 11 am, 6.5 hours after the lift-off from northwest China's Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.
Wang Ya'nan, chief editor of Beijing-based Aerospace Knowledge magazine, said the Shenzhou-19 mission is unique. With its young lineup, the involvement of a female taikonaut and scheduled experiments during the mission, including the unprecedented exposure experiment of the bricks made from simulated lunar soil - a potential building material for future habitats on the moon, the mission carries great importance for the country's development of future manned lunar projects.
Cai returned to the China Space Station on the Shenzhou-19 manned mission just 22 months after his last flight on Shenzhou-14, setting a record for the shortest interval between missions in the history of Chinese taikonauts. Song and Wang were both born in 1990 and are members of the country's third batch taikonauts. The Shenzhou-19 mission is their debut in space. Wang is also the country's first female spaceflight engineer, according to the China Manned Space Agency on Tuesday.
This mission marks the fourth crewed flight in the application and development phase of the space station and the 33rd flight of China's manned space program. Its primary goals are to complete an in-orbit crew rotation with the Shenzhou-18 crew, reside on the space station for about six months, conduct space science and application experiments, perform extravehicular activities (EVAs), manage cargo entry and exit, install and recover space debris protection devices and other external equipment on the space station, Lin Xiqiang, a CMSA spokesperson, revealed at a press conference on Tuesday.
The mission will also involve public outreach, space education, and payload experiments to further enhance space station operational efficiency and maximize its overall utility, Lin said.
During their stay in orbit, the Shenzhou-19 crew will receive the Tianzhou-8 cargo spacecraft and the Shenzhou-20 crewed spacecraft, with their return to the Dongfeng landing site scheduled in late April or early May, said the spokesperson.
After the in-orbit crew rotation with the Shenzhou-19 crew, the Shenzhou 18 crew is set to return to the Dongfeng landing site on November 4, Lin said.
Further optimization
The Global Times learned from the spacecraft developer China Academy of Spacecraft Technology under the country's leading space contractor CASC, on Wednesday that for this Shenzhou-19 mission, the development team optimized the orbital module's design and layout to enhance payload transportation capacity, increasing storage space by 20 percent.
This improvement enables taikonauts and related systems to carry more time-sensitive and ad-hoc supplies. Not only does this advancement support the ongoing improvement of the Shenzhou-19 crewed spacecraft and new-generation spacecraft, gradually enhancing payload transport capabilities, but it also provides more efficient and stable in-orbit support for the long-term operation of China Space Station, the academy said in a statement it provided to the Global Times.
Further optimizing the mission, the Long March-2F Y19 rocket had implemented a 30-day testing and launch preparation process for the first time, its developer, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology revealed to the Global Times.
Future manned moon programs
The Shenzhou-19 crew includes two taikonauts born in 1990, making them the youngest crew since the manned space station missions began, Wang said.
This change can be attributed to two main reasons, he explained that with the space station now operational, there is a need for a large number of taikonauts for rotations and demanding tasks.
China is pressing ahead with its goal to land taikonauts on the moon by 2030, accelerating with the development and construction efforts to turn this ambition into reality, the CMSA announced at a press conference on Tuesday.
Wang also said that considering future manned lunar missions, more taikonauts are needed for both testing and actual flight operations, ideally within the 35 to 45 age range for optimal performance. Thus, the participation of 90s-born taikonauts in current manned space mission is indeed encouraging. Selecting younger taikonauts will help ensure that seasoned taikonauts take on leadership and organizational roles during complex future missions, while younger taikonauts focus on collaborative tasks.
China Space Station also welcomed its third female taikonaut and the first female flight engineer in the latest Shenzhou-19 mission.
As manned space missions evolve, the inclusion of more women in manned flights is becoming an inevitable trend. For long-term missions at the space station or future lunar bases, the dynamics are similar, akin to forming a work family in a closed environment, the participation of female taikonauts greatly benefits the work atmosphere. The involvement of female taikonauts indicates that China will incorporate more female technical personnel in future manned missions, Wang noted.
During the Shenzhou-19 mission, biological experiments at the space station will be further enriched based on the first aquatic ecosystem (fish farming) conducted during Shenzhou-18 mission, including experiments with fruit flies.
Three taikonauts of Shenzhou-19 mission will conduct experiments in life sciences, fluid dynamics, combustion, and materials science. Notably, fruit flies will be used as experimental subjects for the first time, creating a sub-magnetic environment in space to study their growth and behavior, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Zhang Wei, a researcher at the Space Application Engineering and Technology Center of the CAS, explained that while Earth has a magnetic field, the moon lacks one, and Mars has a weak magnetic field. By establishing a sub-magnetic environment in space, researchers can investigate how sub-magnetic conditions and microgravity affect animal behavior and growth development.
Fruit flies are an important model organism due to their small size, short life cycle, rapid reproduction, and relatively low chromosome count, making them ideal for genetic experiments. Additionally, many genes in fruit flies are similar to those in humans, providing insights into human genetic diseases and laying the groundwork for studying human adaptability in space.
Additionally, Zhang revealed that as experimental devices and key technologies advance, rat experiments will also be conducted aboard the China Space Station in the future.
According to China Central Television, the lunar bricks made of lunar soil simulant will be sent to China's space station aboard the Tianzhou-8 cargo spacecraft to verify their mechanical and thermal performance, as well as their ability to withstand cosmic radiation. The first lunar brick is expected to return to Earth by the end of 2025.
This unprecedented exposure experiment on "lunar bricks" is a highlight of the Shenzhou-19 mission, Wang said. "China is broadening its research scope and intensifying its investigation, seeking pathways for swift engineering applications. Research on lunar bricks is essential for future lunar scientific explorations, as building long-term research bases on the moon requires construction materials, with the most practical approach being to utilize local resources and, ideally, on-site manufacturing."
If this exposure experiment yields optimistic results, it would mean that the engineering technology for constructing bases on the moon would be supported by data, ensuring its feasibility, Wang said.
When asked if the Shenzhou-19 manned spacecraft mission embodies China's future moon missions, Kang Guohua, a professor of Aerospace Engineering at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, told the Global Times on Wednesday that one of the most marvelous features of the mission is to bridge the country's grand manned space program and the lunar exploration missions.