China Sends 3 Astronauts, Including a Woman, Into Space - The New York Times The New York Times Space & Cosmos |First Female Astronaut From China Blasts Into Space Search Continue reading the main story SHANGHAI — China sent a crew of three, including the country’s first female astronaut, into space on Saturday to carry out its first manned docking mission, an important step in an ambitious plan to build a Chinese space station by 2020. The successful launching of the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft, powered by a Long March 2F rocket, was shown live on state television from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert in western China. The crew is expected to spend up to 20 days in space and dock with the orbiting Tiangong 1 space lab module, a kind of miniature space station, which China launched in September 2011. The crew will conduct experiments and live for a time in the space module. China has spent billions in the past decade to build a space program to compete with the United States and Russia, and it plans to eventually put a Chinese astronaut on the moon, perhaps by 2016.

Advertisement Continue reading the main story The country sent its first man into space in 2003, and a Chinese astronaut did a spacewalk in 2008. The manned docking would be considered a milestone for China’s space program and the third major step in developing a space program. China completed a docking by remote control in November when the Shenzhou 8 capsule coupled with the Tiangong 1 orbital module, an event that was broadcast live on national television and observed by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao from the control center in Beijing. The launching put China’s first woman into space, a 33-year-old air force pilot named Liu Yang. “This is an important leap forward for China’s manned space program,” said Wu Bangguo, the nation’s top legislator, speaking to the three astronauts before they took flight. Photo Liu Yang, China’s first woman in space, boarded a spacecraft in western China on Saturday. Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images The mission is China’s first manned spaceflight since September 2008. The goal, analysts say, is to dock with the space lab as practice for future dockings with the space station that China plans to build.

One crew member will remain aboard the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft as a precautionary measure while the others enter the Tiangong 1 orbital module. While the mission itself is not unusual, analysts said it extended China’s remarkable pace in developing its space program. “It is the speed with which China is ticking off these boxes in developing their program that is interesting,” said Jeff Kueter, the president of the George C. Marshall Institute, which focuses on how science is used in making public policy. In the days leading up to Saturday’s launching, the Chinese news media ran several profiles of Ms. Liu. The state-run Xinhua news agency reported that she was from Henan Province in central China and lived in Beijing with her husband. She will be in charge of medical experiments during the mission, Xinhua said. The Soviet Union sent the first woman into space in 1963 . The first American woman in space was Sally Ride , in 1983. According to China’s state-run news media, the selection process determined that China’s first woman in space should be married, preferably with a child.

Beijing announced a five-year plan for space exploration in December that included a space lab and the collection of samples from the moon by 2016. The government has previously vowed to reach the moon and establish a manned space station by 2020. The plan, released by the State Council, China’s cabinet, shows how Beijing intends to draw on its military and civilian resources to reach the goals. The People’s Liberation Army drives China’s space program, and civilian institutions like universities and laboratories are subject to the military’s efforts. Advertisement China is considered a leader in the business of launching satellites, but analysts say it is still years behind the United States. David Barboza reported from Shanghai, and Kevin Drew from Hong Kong. A version of this article appears in print on June 17, 2012, on Page A12 of the New York edition with the headline: Woman Joins Chinese Crew On Mission To Space Lab. Order Reprints | Today's Paper | Subscribe How do space rockets work? - Explain that Stuff Tweet by Chris Woodford . Last updated: August 7, 2016.

The most thing exciting thing you can possibly do on Earth is to get away from it: jump in a rocket and blast into space! Rockets always seem to be firing us omto the future, but their basic technology is rooted far in the past—in firework-like missiles developed almost 800 years ago in 13th-century China. Since the first modern liquid-fueled rocket soared to the sky in 1926, rockets have ferried about 500 people, several thousand satellites, and quite a few unmanned probes to the deep darkness beyond Earth. While exploring space is obviously the main point of all that effort, it's worth remembering that "stepping outside" Earth gives us a better understanding of our own planet: weather forecasting, climate research, and navigation are just three of the things we can do better thanks to the development of the space rocket. Now rockets are useful things, but they're also very complex and highly dangerous. How exactly do they work? Let's take a closer look! Photo: An Atlas Centaur rocket launches an Intelsat space satellite in 1991. Picture courtesy of NASA Kennedy Space Center (NASA-KSC) . What exactly is space? Photo: Space as we know it.

Photo of stellar swarm M80 (NGC 6093), a dense star cluster in the Milky Way galaxy, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and courtesy of NASA on the Commons . If you want to understand space rockets, you need to understand space. Strapped to your rocket, whistling your way to the stars, you won't pass any road signs: "Space: Population 0, Please drive carefully." There's no neat dividing line between the end of Earth and the beginning of space. That's because gravity (the force that sucks air molecules toward our planet, creating Earth's atmosphere) reaches out to infinity. In other words, Earth's atmosphere ends gradually, blurring invisibly with the start of space. Where does space start? Most jet planes don't fly above 15km (9.5 miles, 50,000ft), where there's still enough oxygen to burn fuel in their engines and keep them flying, but that's nowhere near the start of space.

Space is generally defined as starting at about 100km (60 miles) above Earth (an arbitrary point sometimes called the Kármán line), which is where conventional planes would struggle to make enough lift to stay in the air. That doesn't mean Earth's atmosphere is all done and dusted by that point; far from it! The lowest satellites (known as low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites) fly at heights above 160km or 100 miles from Earth, which is over 10 times higher than planes fly. Even so, they still feel some drag (aerodynamic resistance) from the outer reaches of our atmosphere, which fizzles on up to 800km (500 miles) or higher. You might think space is a long way away, but a hundred kilometers is not so far: a car, hurtling along at highway speed, would take just an hour to get you there; a rocket will get there about 20 times faster—in just 3 minutes. What is space like? From the point of someone designing a rocket, space is the place effectively beyond Earth's reach—beyond most of its gravity and atmosphere.

Although we tend to think of it as a vacuum, it's not completely empty. There's radiation zipping through it (there must be—how else would we see all those distant stars and planets?), meteorites nipping past, "cosmic dust," and even bits of space junk (broken bits of satellites and rockets). Perhaps the best way to think of space is as a place of wild extremes: emptiness, weightlessness (when you're far from any planets). One minute, deep darkness and extreme cold (when you're shaded from the sun); the next, blinding light, dangerous cosmic radiation, and extreme heat. Is there more than one kind of space? Mostly we're interested in the interplanetary space of our own Solar System (the area round the Sun), which is measured in distances of millions of kilometers. But space telescopes and unmanned probes also study the further reaches of what's called interstellar space (the space between stars), measured in vastly greater distances called light years (the distance light travels in one year, which is almost 10 trillion kilometers).

The Milky Way galaxy, of which our solar system is just one part, measures about 100,000 light years (1 million, million, million km) across. Space, if you haven't figured it out already, is a pretty big place! How do rockets work? Photo: Test firing the Space Shuttle's main engine. Picture courtesy of NASA on the Commons . Now we know what space is, it's easier to understand what a rocket is and how it works. A space rocket is a vehicle with a very powerful jet engine designed to carry people or equipment beyond Earth and out into space. If we define space as the region outside Earth's atmosphere, that means there's not enough oxygen to fuel the kind of conventional engine you'd find on a jet plane. So one way to look at a rocket is as a very special kind of jet-powered vehicle that carries its own oxygen supply. What else can we figure out about rockets straight away? They need great speed and a huge amount of energy to escape the pull of gravity and stop them tumbling back down to Earth like stones. Vast speed and energy mean rocket engines have to generate enormous forces. How enormous?

In his famous 1962 speech championing efforts to go to the Moon, US President John F. Kennedy compared the power of a rocket to "10,000 automobiles with their accelerators on the floor." According to NASA's calculations , the Saturn V moon rocket "generated 34.5 million newtons (7.6 million pounds) of thrust at launch, creating more power than 85 Hoover Dams." Forces Rockets are great examples of how forces make things move. It's a common mistake to think that rockets move forward by "pushing back against the air"—and it's easy to see that this is a mistake when you remember that there's no air in space to push against. Space is literally that: empty space! When it comes to forces, rockets perfectly demonstrate three important scientific rules called the laws of motion , which were developed about 300 years ago by English scientist Isaac Newton (1642–1727). A space rocket obviously doesn't go anywhere unless you start its engine. As Newton said, still things (like rockets parked on launch pads) stay still unless forces act on them (and moving things keep moving at a steady speed unless a force acts to stop them).

Newton said that when a force acts on something, it makes it accelerate (go faster, change direction, or both). So when you fire up your rocket engine, that makes the force that accelerates the rocket into the sky. Rockets move upward by firing hot exhaust gas downward, rather like jet planes—or blown-up balloons from which you let the (cold) air escape. This is an example of what's often called "action and reaction" (another name for Newton's third law of motion): the hot exhaust gas firing down (the action) creates an equal and opposite force (the reaction) that speeds the rocket up. The action is the force of the gas, the reaction's the force acting on the rocket—and the two forces are of equal size, but pointing in opposite directions, and acting on different things (which is why they don't cancel out). Photo: Action and reaction: rockets work by firing jets of hot gas downward (the action), which makes them move upward (the reaction). The gas isn't pushing against anything to make the rocket move: the very act of the gas shooting back moves the rocket forward—and that can happen in "empty" space just as well as inside Earth's atmosphere.

This picture shows Space Shuttle mission STS-26 in 1988, when the Shuttle made its brave and confident return to space after the Challenger disaster two years earlier. Photo courtesy of NASA on the Commons . Thrust and drag The force that pushes a rocket upward is called thrust; it depends on the amount (mass) and speed of gas that the rocket fires and the way its exhaust nozzle is shaped to squirt out that gas in a high-pressure jet. When a rocket's engine develops enough power, the thrust force pushing it upward will be bigger than its own weight (the force of gravity) pulling it down, so the rocket will climb into the sky. As the rocket climbs, air resistance (drag) will try to pull it back too, fighting against the thrust. In an upward-climbing rocket, thrust has to fight both drag and weight. This is slightly different to an airplane , where thrust from the engines makes the plane fly forward, drag pulls the plane backward, and the forward motion of air over the wings generates lift, which overcomes the plane's weight.

So a key difference between a rocket and a jet plane is that a rocket's engine lifts it directly upward into the sky, whereas a jet's engines simply speed the plane forward so its wings can generate lift. A plane's jet engines fire it forwards so its wings can lift it up; a rocket's engines lift it up directly. The faster things move and the more their shape disturbs the air, the more drag they create and the more energy they waste, uselessly, as they speed along. That's why fast-moving things—jet airplanes, high-speed trains, space rockets... and even leaping salmon—tend to be long, thin, and tube-shaped, compared to slower-moving things like boats and trucks, which are less affected by drag. Artwork: Forces acting on a plane (left) and a rocket (right). When a plane flies at steady speed, the forward thrust made by the engines is equal to the air resistance (drag) pulling back. The upward force of lift created by the wings is equal to the downward force of the plane's weight. In other words, the two pairs of forces are in perfect balance. With a rocket, thrust from the engines pushes upward while weight and drag try to pull it back down.

When the rocket accelerates upward, the thrust is greater than the combined lift and drag. The various surfaces of a rocket can also produce lift, just like the wings of a plane, but it acts sideways instead of upwards. Although this sounds confusing, it's easy to see why if you imagine the blue plane rotated through 90 degrees so it's flying straight up like a rocket: the lift would also be pointing sideways. Escape velocity Rockets burn huge amounts of fuel very quickly to reach escape velocity of at least 25,000 mph (7 miles per second or 40,000 km/h), which is how fast something needs to go to break away from the pull of Earth's gravity. "Escape velocity" suggests a rocket must be going that fast at launch or it won't escape from Earth, but that's a little bit misleading, for several reasons. First, it would be more correct to refer to "escape speed," since the direction of the rocket (which is what the word velocity really implies) isn't all that relevant and will constantly change as the rocket curves up into space. (You can read more about the difference between speed and velocity in our article on motion ).

Second, escape velocity is really about energy , not velocity or speed. To escape from Earth, a rocket must do work against the force of gravity as it travels over a distance. When we say a rocket has escape velocity, we really mean it has at least enough kinetic energy to escape the pull of Earth's gravity (though you can never escape it completely). Finally, a rocket doesn't get all its kinetic energy in one big dollop at the start of its voyage: it gets further injections of energy by burning fuel as it goes. Quibbles aside, "escape velocity" is a quick and easy shorthand that helps us understand one basic point: a huge amount of energy is needed to get anything up into space. Parts of a space rocket A rocket contains about three million bits , of all shapes and sizes, but it's simpler to think of it as being made up of four separate parts.

There's the structure (the framework that holds the whole thing together, similar to the fuselage on a plane), the propulsion system (the engine, fuel tanks, and any outer rocket boosters), the guidance system (the onboard, computer-based navigation that steers the rocket to its destination), and the payload (whatever the rocket is carrying, from people or satellites to space-station parts or even nuclear warheads). Modern space rockets work like two or three independent rockets stuck together to form what are called stages. Each stage may have its own propulsion and guidance system, though typically only the final stage contains the rocket's all-important payload. The lower stages break away in turn as they use up their fuel and only the upper stage reaches the rocket's final destination. Some rockets (the Space Shuttle and the European Ariane) look like a whole bunch of rockets "strapped" together: a fat one in the middle with some skinnier ones either side. The big central rocket is the main one. The thinner rockets either side are what are called booster rockets. They're little more than fat fireworks: disposable engines that provide a thump of extra power during liftoff to get the main rocket up into space.

Artwork: Little pieces of history: An interesting cutaway showing the main component parts of the now-retired Space Shuttle orbiter. Picture courtesy of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (NASA-MSFC) . Browse the hi-resolution version of this image (via Wikimedia Commons). Rocket engines The biggest (and arguably the most interesting) part of a rocket is the propulsion system—the engine that powers it into the sky. As we've already seen, rockets differ from jet planes (and other fuel-powered vehicles that work on Earth) because they have to carry their own oxygen supply. Modern space rockets have main engines powered by a liquid fuel (such as liquid hydrogen) and liquid oxygen (which does the same job as the air sucked into a car engine) that are pumped in from huge tanks. The fuel (also called the propellant ) and oxygen (called the oxidizer) are stored at low temperatures and high pressures so more can be carried in tanks of a certain size, which means the rocket can go further on the same volume of fuel. External rocket boosters that assist a main rocket engine typically burn solid fuel instead (the Space Shuttle's were called solid rocket boosters, or SRBs, for exactly that reason).

They work more like large, intercontinental ballistic missiles, which also burn solid fuels. Artwork: How a space rocket works—greatly simplified: Unlike airplane jet engines , which take in air as they fly through the sky, space rockets have to carry their own oxygen supplies (oxidizers) with them because there is no air in space. Liquid hydrogen (the fuel) from one tank is mixed with liquid oxygen (the oxidizer) from a separate tank using pumps and valves to control the flow. The oxidizer and fuel mix and burn in the combustion chamber, making a hot blast of exhaust gas that propels the rocket. The payload (the cargo—such as a satellite) occupies a relatively small proportion of the rocket's total volume in the nose-cone at the top. A typical space rocket: Ariane 5 How many space rockets can you name? The mighty Saturn V that took astronauts to the Moon is probably top of your list. Or what about the super-versatile Atlas rockets? The first one took off on June 11, 1957 and the latest version, Atlas 5, is still blasting off today.

The highlights of that half-century history include putting the first US astronaut into space, sending the Pioneer-10 space probe to Jupiter and beyond, and launching the ten Mariner program missions to explore Mars, Venus, and Mercury. Outside the United States, there's the European Ariane rocket. Originally dreamed up in 1973 as a joint project between France, Germany, and the UK, it's gradually established itself as one of the most reliable of rockets, launching over half of the world's commercial satellites from its base on French Guiana. The latest version, Ariane 5, has launched about 90 times since its maiden voyage in 1996 (with only two major failures). Key parts of an Ariane rocket Sitting on the launchpad, Ariane has three main parts: the central rocket (up to 53m or 174ft high), powered by the main engine (Vulcain 2), and two 31m/101ft-high solid rocket boosters (one either side). The main rocket consists of two stages. The first (lower) stage is called the Cryogenic Main Stage (or EPC).

Powered by the Vulcain engine, and assisted by the two SRBs, its job is to get the rocket and its payload out of Earth's atmosphere and into space. The second (upper) stage is called the Cryogenic Upper Stage (ESC-A). It's powered by a much smaller engine called Aestus, which produces a tiny 2.6 tonnes of thrust, just enough to put the rocket into its final orbit ready for the release of the satellites it carries as payload. The payload travels in the very top part of the rocket behind a detachable fairing (streamlined outer cover) that measures 17m high by 5.4m in diameter (56ft high by 18ft in diameter). The usual payload is either one or two satellites fixed either side of a launching structure called the Speltra (or a slightly different one called the Sylda). Artwork: The parts of an Ariane 5 rocket. The central rocket comprises two stages: the lower Cryogenic Main Stage (EPC, orange dotted line) and the Cryogenic Upper Stage (ESC-A, gray dotted line). Solid rocket boosters (orange) stand on each side.

Inside the central rocket, the main parts are: 1) Detachable fairing to protect payload as the rocket blasts through Earth's atmosphere; 2) Payload consisting of (in this mission) two satellites to be launched; 3) Satellite mounted on top is launched last; 4) Speltra structure allows two satellites to be launched in the same mission; 5) Satellite mounted underneath Speltra is launched first; 6) Small Aestus engine; 7) Liquid oxygen tank; 8) Liquid hydrogen tank; 9) Vulcain main engine. A typical Ariane mission It takes Ariane less than an hour to put two satellites into space: Liftoff: At liftoff, the rocket weighs up to 780 tonnes (as much as about 500 cars), of which the payload represents 10 tonnes at most. In other words, the cargo represents just 1 percent of the total weight! To put this huge mass into space, Ariane 5 has to produce a total of about 1340 tonnes of thrust: 1200 from the two SRBs (600 each) and 140 from the Vulcain engine.

At liftoff, the Vulcain fires first; the SRBs start up a few seconds later. SRBs jettisoned: The SRBs fire for about two and a half minutes before separating from the main stage when it reaches an altitude of about 69km (42 miles). The SRBs reenter Earth's atmosphere, then fall into the Atlantic Ocean. Payload fairing jettisoned: Once the rocket is safely outside Earth's atmosphere, about three minutes after launch and an altitude above 100km (62 miles), explosive (pyrotechnic) charges split the protective payload fairing apart and it's jettisoned. Cryogenic main engine jettisoned: The main Vulcain engine fires for about nine minutes in total (from the launch), during which time it burns 25 tonnes of liquid hydrogen and 150 tonnes of liquid oxygen. At a height of about 200km (124 miles), the main stage (EPC) shuts down and is jettisoned from the rest of the craft. It reenters Earth's atmosphere, also destined for the ocean.

Upper stage moves into orbit: The upper stage engine (ESCA) ignites and positions the remainder of the rocket in orbit before shutting down roughly 25 minutes into the mission at an altitude of 640km (400 miles). First satellite separates: Just over 27 minutes into the mission, the first satellite splits away from the Speltra and maneuvers itself into orbit, leaving the second satellite still attached to the launch vehicle. Second satellite separates: About 35 minutes into the mission, the second satellite splits away from the Speltra and maneuvers into orbit. End of mission: The entire mission takes roughly 50 minutes from launch to completion. A closer look at a scientific rocket It's not rocket science, even when it is! Rockets might be super complex, but if you think about them carefully, you'll find the bits inside are arranged in a very logical way that soon makes sense. To see what I mean, let's explore a very early rocket design in a bit more detail. It was developed by Robert Hutchings Goddard (1882–1945), an American physicist widely considered to be the father of the modern space rocket.

This artwork comes from a patent that Goddard filed in 1914 for a rocket that could rise to high altitudes and take photos. Remember that this was back in the early 20th century, long before satellites had entered space or astronauts had plodded over the moon. Goddard's clever idea here was to put a rocket inside a rocket, which is a bit like the modern idea of a rocket with stages. You can see the entire rocket in Figure 1 on the right. The main rocket engine is colored red. You light it with a fuse (14), which burns up and ignites disks of fuel (12). Once all the fuel is burned up and the rocket has reached a fairly high altitude, the second rocket (blue) mounted on top ignites, separates, and fires off even higher. Because the second rocket weighs much less than the first one, a certain amount of fuel will make it rise very much higher into the sky than if that fuel had to lift both rockets together. The rocket keeps its stability by spinning round at high speed as it flies along, just like a bullet fired from a gun. Figure 3 shows how this happens.

It's a cross-section through the rocket at the point marked 3—3 in Figure 1 (where the blue and red rockets meet). Inserts of fuel (16) burn and send jets of hot gas outward at tangents, making the rocket body rotate. Unlike the main rocket engine, the spinning jets are ignited by an electrical circuit shown as 18, 19, and 20, which enables them to fire simultaneously. In practice, you'd fire up these tangential rockets to make the rocket spin around on its stand (Figure 5), on ball bearings (22) and, once it's spinning, light the main fuse (14) to blast it into the sky. The business part of the rocket—the part that does our useful work—is the payload section on the top. This is shown in Figure 2 on the left. Goddard's rocket was designed for taking photographs from high altitude, so we have a camera (orange, 36) and a gyroscope and induction motor (purple, top) which keeps it pointing in the same direction while the rocket spins. So it's nothing like as complicated as it looks!

Artwork: Early design for a high-altitude rocket camera from US Patent: 1,102,653: Rocket Apparatus by Robert Hutchings Goddard, July 7, 1914, courtesy of US Patent and Trademark Office (with some details removed and colors added for ease of explanation). Who invented rockets? A brief timeline of rocket history Photo: The father of modern rocketry, Robert Hutchings Goddard, pictured in November 1925 with one of his inventions , the double-acting rocket engine. Goddard first got the idea of traveling into space as a teenager, after climbing a cherry tree in his family's garden: "I imagined how wonderful it would be to make some device which had even the possibility of ascending to Mars..." His many inventions included powering rockets with liquid fuels and constructing rockets with multiple stages—two fundamentally important ideas used in virtually every successful space rocket launched to date. Picture courtesy of NASA on the Commons . Early milestones ~700–900: Chinese inventors develop gunpowder.

1232: Chinese warriors use firework-like rockets, which they called "arrows of flying fire," to defend the city of Kaifeng from Mongol attack. 1865: French writer Jules Verne stimulates an appetite for space travel by publishing his classic book From the Earth to the Moon . 1869: Edward Everett Hale publishes a story called The Brick Moon , describing the idea of an artificial navigation satellite. 1903: Russian teacher Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857–1935) publishes A Rocket into Cosmic Space. His notable achievements include proposing the idea of liquid-fueled rockets, rocket stages, and the rocket equation (the basic math of space travel). 1916: US physics professor Robert Hutchings Goddard (1882–1945), often named "the father of modern rocketry," sets out his ideas in a 70-page report called A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes. Buried among its pages are a suggestion for sending a rocket to the Moon.

1920: On January 12, 1920, an editorial in The New York Times calls Goddard's ideas for a Moon rocket "absurd," arguing that they "lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." 1923: German physicist, Hermann Oberth (1894–1989) publishes an influential book called The Rocket into Interplanetary Space, explaining how rockets can operate in the vacuum of space. 1924: Scientists in the Soviet Union (an alliance of Russia and neighboring states) found a Society for the Study of Interplanetary Travel. A US equivalent, the American Interplanetary Society, is set up six years later. 1926: Robert Hutchings Goddard launches the first practical liquid-fueled rocket on March 16, 1926. 1942–1945: During World War II, German scientists lead by Wernher von Braun (1912–1977) develop the V-2 long-distance rocket-based missile that launches devastating attacks on enemy cities, including London, England.

After the war ends, von Braun and over 100 other German rocket scientists relocate to the United States, where they begin working for the US military and, eventually, the American space agency NASA. Photo: An early Atlas rocket photographed in 1963. Picture courtesy of NASA on the Commons . Manned spaceflight 1957: Soviet Union launches Sputnik 1 , the first Earth-orbiting satellite, on October 4, 1957. Sputnik 2 blasts off a month later, on November 3, with a canine cosmonaut, Laika the dog, onboard. 1959: Part conventional airplane and part rocket, NASA and the US Air Force's experimental X-15 rocket plane makes its maiden voyage in September 1959. Over the next few years, it helps military pilots train for high-speed, high-altitude rocket flight and sets the world speed record for a human-crewed airplane of almost 7 times the speed of sound.

1961: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (1934–1968) becomes the first person to venture into space and orbit Earth on April 12, 1961. The following month, on May 5, Alan Shepard (1923–1998) of the US Navy becomes the first American astronaut in space flying in a Mercury spacecraft. 1963: Valentina Tereshkova (1937–) becomes the first woman in space in the Soviet Vostok 6 mission. 1969: On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin are the first men to set foot on the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission, helped by their colleague Michael Collins, who remains in lunar orbit. Five more Apollo missions successfully explore the Moon until the final one, Apollo 17, concludes on December 19, 1972. The day after the Moon landing, The New York Times apologizes for mocking Goddard's original idea of Moon rockets: "It is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere.

The Times regrets the error." 1971–1982: The Soviet Union launches a series of seven manned Salyut space stations where cosmonauts set a number of endurance records for the longest continuous time spent in space. 1973: The United States launches its rival space station, Skylab . It remains in orbit until 1979, when it finally crashes back to Earth 1982: The US Space Shuttle , a reusable space plane, makes its maiden voyage. 1986: The Shuttle program comes to an abrupt end on January 28, 1986 when Challenger, one of the Shuttle fleet, explodes one minute after launch of mission STS-51-L , killing all seven people onboard. 1986: The Soviets launch Mir , a continuously crewed space station. It remains in orbit until 2001, over three times its planned lifespan. 1998: Construction of the International Space Station begins on November 20, 1988. It gradually takes shape following a further 115 space flights.

The current structure is four times bigger than Mir, five times bigger than Skylab, and as long as an (American) football field. 2004: SpaceShipOne wins the Ansari X Prize (a competition to develop the first reusable, non-government space plane), making its maiden flight into space on June 21, 2004. 2010: NASA and the US Air Force successfully test a 9m- (30ft)- long reusable, unmanned space drone called the X-37B , built by Boeing. 2011: The Space Shuttle fleet is officially retired after a total of 135 missions. The four surviving Shuttles find new homes in museums around the United States . 2015: The European Space Agency (ESA) makes a successful test flight of its own reusable space plane, the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV) . stumbleupon Email Comment In the past generation, scientists, politicians, businessmen and many others had been very curious with the life out of earth. Many have been asking about what the universe looks like, and all these questions that pertain to the outer space were always answered by speculations and hunches.

With the advanced technology, people have explored the possibility of actually stepping out of the earth’s atmosphere to see how beautiful the universe is, thus, the birth of what we call space missions. Space missions or space flights have become part of human achievement in the 20th century. The Soviet Union started sending space missions, which inspired other countries to explore the space as well. And in line with that, here are the top ten countries with the most space presence. 10. Israel The Israel Space Agency is part of the country’s Ministry of Science and Technology. The agency coordinates all space research programs of the country and was established in 1983. Some of the resources of the space agency goes to one of their current projects called the Venus Project, with a budget of around $6 million. They have an annual budget of $70 million for their other programs. 9. Iran Iran has been launching satellites and space flights since the year 2005. The country has been active in the Asian space race. Their first launch was the joint Iranian-Russian Sinah-1 project, which cost them $15 million.

In the year 2008, Iran had a joint research with Thailand and China, launching a satellite named Long March 2C, which cost around $6.5 million. Iran’s second satellite was actually placed in an orbit in the year 2009. This satellite was designed for research and telecommunications. 8. South Korea South Korea, together with China and Japan, is one of Asia’s leading countries when it comes to launching space missions. As of today, they have already launched three space flights. The first one was the Naro-1 and it was sent outside the planet three times. The total cost of the first three launches was over $450 million and the third launch was the most successful among the three. 7. Japan Japan is one of Asia’s leading countries in terms of space flights and missions. Japan always has the latest satellite and rocket capabilities for different purposes. They have also conducted manned space activities and other science related missions and explorations. Their first launch was the Hayabusa that cost the country $138 million. Japan is planning to launch the Hayabusa 2 in the year 2014, which has an estimated cost of $150-400 million. 6.

United Kingdom The United Kingdom has also recently established their own space agency. It was inagurated in April 2010 and has taken over the responsibilities for government policy and budget for space explorations. The country, together with the European Space Agency, has already spent about $155 million for the delivery of astronomical data and the launch of sub-orbital rockets and the like. They are currently budgeting around $16 to $31 million for the development of their intermediate missions. 5. India Although the ancient Indians were quite known for their knowledge about rocket science, it was only after their independence that they were able to practice it, especially in exploring more about the space. Dr. Vikram Sarabhai founded the Physical Research Laboratory, which is a great leap that catapulted India into one of the leading countries in terms of space presence. India’s biggest success was the launching of its first satellite into space. As of the present, India has been providing a heftier budget for space programs to widen their knowledge on what the space really has to offer.

They have already spent about $1.6 billion for the past launches and is planning to spend about $1.34 billion for 2013 for their other space programs. 4. France Europe has their European Space Agency (ESA), which is dedicated to the exploration of natural occurrences outside the planet. The agency was established in 1975 and is now based in Paris, France. France’s space programs include human spaceflight and other unmanned exploration missions to other planets. The country will be launching a new space balloon, with which the agency would provide a budget of $10 million for the construction and the flight itself. The agency already spent about $5.3 billion for their space flight missions in the year 2012. 3. China China’s space program is directed by the country’s National Space Administration called CNSA. China had a rudimentary ballistic missile program but their first crewed space program only began decades later. This achievement placed China as the third country to send humans into space independently. They are now planning to launch their fifth space flight costing about $6.27 billion.

In the year 2020, CNSA have plans on putting a permanent space station and crewed expeditions to Mars and to the moon. 2. Russia (Soviet Union) Russia was the first country to have ever launched a space mission. They actually had plenty of firsts: intercontinental ballistic missile, satellite launch, first man and woman in space and Earth orbit, first animal in space, moon impact and spacewalk, race rover, interplanetary probe, image of the side of the moon, space station, and unmanned lunar soft landing. Russia’s first space flight was the Vostok program. The flight made Yuri Gagarin one of the most famous people back then since he was the first man to have ever journeyed outside the planet. The government had a federal space budget of $2.4 billion in the year 2009. In 2011, the government spent about $3.8 billion for their space programs. Their proposed budget for the year 2013 is $5.6 billion. 1. United States of America Although they were not the first country to explore the universe, they have the most number of space missions sent out of earth.

Their first space flight was under the Mercury Program. Project Mercury spanned five years and it cost around $277 million. The second one was the Gemini program, which had a lifespan of six years and cost approximately $1.3 billion. The most famous space mission that the country has done was the Apollo. The program cost $20.4 billion, which had a lifespan of fifteen years. The United States has spent approximately $486 billion over the past 57 years on human space flights alone. On the average, the country spent $8.3 billion a year on space missions. 151 Shares Animals in Space A Brief History of Animals in Space Before humans actually went into space, one of the prevailing theories of the perils of space flight was that humans might not be able to survive long periods of weightlessness. For several years, there had been a serious debate among scientists about the effects of prolonged weightlessness. American and Russian scientists utilized animals - mainly monkeys, chimps and dogs - in order to test each country's ability to launch a living organism into space and bring it back alive and unharmed.

On June 11, 1948, a V-2 Blossom launched into space from White Sands, New Mexico carrying Albert I, a rhesus monkey. Lack of fanfare and documentation made Albert an unsung hero of animal astronauts. On June 14, 1949, a second V-2 flight carrying a live Air Force Aeromedical Laboratory monkey, Albert II, attained an altitude of 83 miles. The monkey died on impact. On August 31, 1950, another V-2 was launched and carried an unanaesthetized mouse that was photographed in flight and did not survive impact. On December 12, 1949, the last V-2 monkey flight was launched at White Sands. Albert IV, a rhesus monkey attached to monitoring instruments, was the payload. It was a successful flight, with no ill effects on the monkey until impact, when it died. On September 20, 1951, a monkey named Yorick and 11 mice were recovered after an Aerobee missile flight of 236,000 feet at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico.

Yorick got a fair amount of press as the first monkey to live through a space flight. On May 22, 1952, two Philippine monkeys, Patricia and Mike, were enclosed in an Aerobee nose section at Holloman Air Force Base. Patricia was placed in a seated position and Mike in a prone position to determine differences in the effects of rapid acceleration. Fired 36 miles up at a speed of 2000 mph, these two monkeys were the first primates to reach such a high altitude. Also on this flight were two white mice, Mildred and Albert. They were inside a slowly rotating drum where they could "float" during the period of weightlessness. The section containing the animals was recovered safely from the upper atmosphere by parachute. Patricia died of natural causes about two years later and Mike died in 1967, both at the National Zoological Park in Washington, DC. The Soviets kept close tabs on what the U.S. was doing with their V-2 and Aerobee missile projects during the early 1950's.

Basing their experiments on American biomedical research, Soviet rocket pioneer Sergei Korolev, his biomedical expert Vladimir Yazdovsky, and a small team used mice, rats and rabbits as one-way passengers for their initial tests. They needed to gather data to design a cabin to carry a human being into space. Eventually they chose small dogs for this phase of testing. Dogs were chosen over monkeys because it was felt that they would be less fidgety in flight. A test with two dogs would allow for more accurate results. They chose females because of the relative ease of controlling waste. Between 1951 and 1952, the Soviet R-1 series rockets carried nine dogs altogether, with three dogs flying twice. Each flight carried a pair of dogs in hermetically sealed containers that were recovered by parachute. Of these early space-bound hounds, a few have been remembered by name. On August 15, 1951, Dezik and Tsygan ("Gypsy") were launched. These two were the first canine suborbital astronauts. They were successfully retrieved. In early September 1951, Dezik and Lisa were launched. This second early Russian dog flight was unsuccessful.

The dogs died but a data recorder survived. Korolev was devastated by the loss of these dogs. Shortly afterwards, Smelaya ("Bold") and Malyshka ("Little One") were launched. Smelaya ran off the day before the launch. The crew was worried that wolves that lived nearby would eat her. She returned a day later and the test flight resumed successfully. The fourth test launch was a failure, with two dog fatalities. However, in the same month, the fifth test launch of two dogs was successful. On September 15, 1951, the sixth of the two-dog launches occurred. One of the two dogs, Bobik, escaped and a replacement was found near the local canteen. She was a mutt, given the name ZIB, the Russian acronym for "Substitute for Missing Dog Bobik." The two dogs reached 100 kilometers and returned successfully. Other dogs associated with this series of flights included Albina ("Whitey"), Dymka ("Smoky"), Modnista ("Fashionable"), and Kozyavka ("Gnat").

On November 3rd, 1957, Sputnik 2 blasted into Earth orbit with a dog named Laika aboard. Laika, which is Russian for "Husky" or "Barker," had the real name of Kudryavka ("Little Curly"). In the U.S. she was eventually dubbed "Muttnik." Laika was a small, stray mongrel picked up from the street. She was hastily trained and put aboard in a metal carrier under the second Sputnik sphere. There was no time to work out any reentry strategy and Laika expired after a few hours. Sputnik 2 finally burned up in the outer atmosphere in April 1958. Back in the U.S., on April 23, 1958 a mouse was launched in a Thor-Able "Reentry 1" test as the first launch in the Mouse in Able (MIA) project. It was lost when the rocket was destroyed after launch from Cape Canaveral. The second launch in the series was MIA-2, or Laska, in a Thor-Able "Reentry 2" test on July 9, 1958.

Laska endured 60G acceleration and 45 minutes of weightlessness before perishing. Wilkie, the third mouse in the MIA series, was lost at sea after the flight from Cape Canaveral on July 23, 1958. Fourteen mice were lost when the Jupiter rocket they were aboard was destroyed after launch from Cape Canaveral on September 16, 1959. Gordo, a squirrel monkey, was catapulted 600 miles high in a Jupiter rocket, also on December 13, 1958, one year after the Soviets launched Laika. Gordo's capsule was never found in the Atlantic Ocean. He died on splashdown when a flotation mechanism failed, but Navy doctors said signals on his respiration and heartbeat proved humans could withstand a similar trip. Able, an American-born rhesus monkey, and Baker, a South American squirrel monkey, followed on May 28, 1959, aboard an Army Jupiter missile. Launched in the nose cone, the two animals were carried to a 300-mile altitude, and both were recovered unharmed.

However, Able died June 1 on the operating table from effects of anesthesia, as doctors were about to remove an electrode from under her skin. Baker died of kidney failure in 1984 at age 27. Four black mice were launched on June 3, 1959, on Discoverer 3, part of the Corona program of U.S. spy satellites, which was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base on a Thor Agena A rocket. This was the only Discoverer flight with an animal payload. The mice died when the Agena upper stage fired downward, driving the vehicle into the Pacific Ocean. The first try at launch was scrubbed after the telemetry indicated no sign of activity in the capsule and the first crew of four black mice was found dead. The mouse cages had been sprayed with krylon to cover rough edges, and the mice had found the krylon tastier than their formula and overdosed on it. The second try at launch with a backup mouse crew was halted when the humidity sensor in the capsule indicated 100-percent humidity.

The capsule was opened up and it was discovered that the sensor was located underneath one of the mouse cages; it was unable to distinguish the difference between water and mouse urine. After the sensor was dried out, the launch proceeded. Sam, a rhesus monkey, was one of the most well known monkeys of the space program. His name was an acronym for the U.S. Air Force S chool of A viation M edicine at Brooks Air Force Base, Texas. He was launched on December 4, 1959, housed in a cylindrical capsule within the Mercury spacecraft atop a Little Joe rocket in order to test the launch escape system (LES). Approximately one minute into the flight, traveling at a speed of 3685 mph, the Mercury capsule aborted from the Little Joe launch vehicle. After attaining an altitude of 51 miles, the spacecraft landed safely in the Atlantic Ocean. Sam was recovered, several hours later, with no ill effects from his journey. He was later returned to the colony in which he trained, where he died in November 1982 and his remains were cremated.

Miss Sam, another rhesus monkey and Sam's mate, was launched on January 21, 1960, for another test of the LES. The Mercury capsule attained a velocity of 1800 mph and an altitude of 9 miles. After landing in the Atlantic Ocean 10.8 miles downrange from the launch site, Miss Sam was also retrieved in overall good condition. She was also returned to her training colony until her death on an unknown date. In the Soviet Union, meanwhile, testing was also taking place on more dogs. On July 28, 1960, Bars ("Panther" or "Lynx") and Lisichka ("Little Fox") were launched on a Korabl Sputnik, a prototype of the Vostok manned spacecraft. The booster exploded on launch, killing the two dogs. On August 19, 1960, Belka ("Squirrel") and Strelka ("Little Arrow") were launched on Sputnik 5 or Korabl Sputnik 2, along with a gray rabbit, 40 mice, 2 rats, and 15 flasks of fruit flies and plants.

Strelka later gave birth to a litter of six puppies one of which was given to JFK as a gift for his children. Pchelka ("Little Bee") and Muska ("Little Fly") were launched onboard Sputnik 6 or Korabl Sputnik 3 on December 1, 1960 along with mice, insects, and plants. The capsule and animals burned up on re-entry. On December 22, 1960, soviet scientists attempted to launch Damka ("Little Lady") and Krasavka ("Beauty") on a Korabl Sputnik. However, the upper rocket stage failed and the launch was aborted. The dogs were safely recovered after their unplanned suborbital flight. On March 9, 1961, another Russian dog, Chernushka ("Blackie") was launched on Sputnik 9 or Korabl Sputnik 4. Chernushka was accompanied into space with a dummy cosmonaut, some mice, and a guinea pig.

Zvezdochka ("Little Star") was launched onboard Sputnik 10 or Korabl Sputnik 5 on March 25, 1961.The dog went up with simulated cosmonaut "Ivan Ivanovich" and successfully tested the spacecraft's structure and systems. On January 31, 1961, Ham, whose name was an acronym for H olloman A ero M ed, became the first chimpanzee in space, aboard the Mercury Redstone rocket on a sub-orbital flight very similar to Alan Shepard's. Ham was brought from the French Camaroons, West Africa, where he was born July 1957, to Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico in 1959. The original flight plan called for an altitude of 115 miles and speeds ranging up to 4400 mph. However, due to technical problems, the spacecraft carrying Ham reached an altitude of 157 miles and a speed of 5857 mph and landed 422 miles downrange rather than the anticipated 290 miles. Ham performed well during his flight and splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean 60 miles from the recovery ship.

He experienced a total of 6.6 minutes of weightlessness during a 16.5-minute flight. A post-flight medical examination found Ham to be slightly fatigued and dehydrated, but in good shape otherwise. Ham's mission paved the way for the successful launch of America's first human astronaut, Alan B. Shepard, Jr., on May 5, 1961. Upon the completion of a thorough medical examination, Ham was placed on display at the Washington Zoo in 1963 where he lived alone until September 25, 1980. He then was moved to the North Carolina Zoological Park in Asheboro. Upon his death on January 17, 1983, Ham's skeleton would be retained for ongoing examination by the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. His other remains were respectfully laid to rest in front of the International Space Hall of Fame in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Goliath, a one-and-a-half-pound squirrel monkey, was launched in an Air Force Atlas E rocket on November 10, 1961.

The SPURT (Small Primate Unrestrained Test) monkey was killed when the rocket was destroyed 35 seconds after launch from Cape Canaveral. Enos became the first chimp to orbit the earth on November 29, 1961, aboard a Mercury Atlas rocket. Although the mission plan originally called for three orbits, due to a malfunctioning thruster and other technical difficulties, flight controllers were forced to terminate Enos' flight after two orbits. Enos landed in the recovery area and was picked up 75 minutes after splashdown. He was found to be in good overall condition and both he and the Mercury spacecraft performed well. His mission concluded the testing for a human orbital flight, achieved by John Glenn on February 20, 1962. Enos died at Holloman Air Force Base of a non-space related case of dysentery 11 months after his flight. On October 18, 1963, French scientists launched the first cat into space on a Veronique AGI sounding rocket No. 47.

The cat, named Fï¿½licette, was successfully retrieved after a parachute descent, but a second feline flight on October 24 ran into difficulties that prevented recovery. Back in the Soviet Union, the dogs Veterok ("Breeze") and Ugoyok ("Little Piece Of Coal") were launched aboard Kosmos 110 by the Soviet Union on February 22, 1966. The flight was an evaluation of prolonged effects during space travel of radiation from the Van Allen Belts on animals. Twenty-one days in space still stand as a canine record and was only surpassed by humans in June 1974 with the flight of Skylab 2. The year 1968 saw the U.S.S.R. turn once again to the animal kingdom for the first passengers of their new, manned moon ship. The first successful Zond ("probe") launch was on September 15, 1968, when Zond 5 was launched. A biological payload of turtles, wine flies, mealworms, plants, seeds, bacteria, and other living matter was included in the flight. On September 18, 1968, the spacecraft flew around the Moon.

On September 21, 1968, the reentry capsule entered the earth's atmosphere, braked aerodynamically, and deployed parachutes at 7 km. The capsule splashed down in the Indian Ocean and was successfully recovered, but a failure of the reentry guidance system subjected the biological specimens to a ballistic 20G reentry. Zond 6 was launched on a lunar flyby mission on November 10, 1968. The spacecraft carried a biological payload similar to Zond 5. Zond 6 flew around the Moon on November 14, 1968. Unfortunately, the spacecraft lost a gasket on the return flight resulting in the loss of cabin atmosphere and destruction of the biological specimens. From 1966 to 1969, the U.S. launched three missions in the Biosatellite series. A total of six flights were planned. The first mission in the Biosatellite series, Biosatellite I, was launched on December 14, 1966, from Cape Kennedy by a Delta rocket.

The scientific payload, consisting of 13 select biology and radiation experiments, was exposed to microgravity during 45 hours of Earth-orbital flight. Experimental biology packages on the spacecraft contained a variety of specimens, including insects, frog eggs, microorganisms, and plants. Reentry into the Earth's atmosphere was not achieved because the retrorocket failed to ignite and the biosatellite was never recovered. Although not all the mission objectives were accomplished, the Biosatellite I experience provided technical confidence in the program because of excellent performance in most other areas. Improvements were made in hardware, prelaunch tests, and procedures before Biosatellite II was launched on September 7, 1967 from Cape Kennedy. The planned three-day mission was recalled early because of the threat of a tropical storm in the recovery area, and because of a communication problem between the spacecraft and the tracking systems. It carried a biological payload similar to Biosatellite I. The primary objective of the Biosatellite II mission was to determine if organisms were more, or less, sensitive to ionizing radiation in microgravity than on Earth.

To study this question, an artificial source of radiation (Strontium 85) was supplied to a group of experiments mounted in the forward part of the spacecraft. The last spacecraft in the series, Biosatellite III, was launched on June 28, 1969. On board was a single, male, pig-tailed monkey (Macaca nemestrina) named Bonnie, weighing 6 kg, for a planned 30-day mission. The mission objective was to investigate the effect of space flight on brain states, behavioral performance, cardiovascular status, fluid and electrolyte balance, and metabolic state. However, after just under nine days in orbit, the mission was terminated because of the subject's deteriorating health. Bonnie died eight hours after he was recovered due to a heart attack brought about by dehydration. After the manned lunar landing of Apollo 11, the role of animals was limited to the status of "biological payload." The range of species broadened to include rabbits, turtles, insects, spiders, fish, jellyfish, amoebae, and algae.

Although they were still used in tests dealing with long-range health effects in space, tissue development, and mating in a zero-g environment, etc., animals no longer made the front pages. One exception to this was one of the last Apollo flights, Skylab 3, which launched on July 28, 1973. On board were Anita and Arabella, two common Cross spiders. Tests were set up to record the spiders' successful attempts to spin webs in space. From 1973 to 1996, Russia, or its predecessor, the Soviet Union, launched a series of life sciences satellites called Bion. Research partners have included Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, China, the Commonwealth of Independent States, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, the European Space Agency, France, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Ukraine, and the United States. The Bion spacecraft is a modified Vostok type and is launched on a Soyuz rocket from the Plesetsk Kosmodrome in northern Russia. Bion missions are typically put under the Kosmos umbrella name, used for a variety of different satellites including spy satellites.

The first Bion launch was Kosmos 605 launched on October 31, 1973. The satellite carried tortoises, rats, insects, and fungi on a 22-day mission. Other missions have also carried plants, mold, quail eggs, fish, newts, frogs, cells, and seeds. Starting with Bion 6 (Kosmos 1514), these missions have carried pairs of monkeys. Bion 6/Kosmos 1514 was launched December 14, 1983, and carried the monkeys Abrek and Bion on a five-day flight. Bion 7/Kosmos 1667 was launched July 10, 1985 and carried the monkeys Verny ("Faithful") and Gordy ("Proud") on a seven-day flight. Bion 8/Kosmos 1887 was launched September 29, 1987, and carried the monkeys Yerosha ("Drowsy") and Dryoma ("Shaggy") on a 13-day flight. Yerosha partially freed himself from his restraints and explored his orbital cage during the mission.

On reentry, Bion 8 missed its touchdown point by 1850 miles, resulting in the death of several fish on board due to the frigid weather. Bion 9/Kosmos 2044 was launched September 15, 1989, and carried the monkeys Zhakonya and Zabiyaka ("Troublemaker") on a 14-day flight. Temperature problems onboard resulted in the loss of ant and earthworm experiments. Bion 10/Kosmos 2229 was launched December 29, 1992, and carried the monkeys Krosh ("Tiny") and Ivasha on a 12-day flight. Bion 10 was recovered two days early due to thermal control problems that resulted in unacceptably high onboard temperatures. Seven of fifteen tadpoles onboard died as a result of the high temperatures. Both monkeys were treated for dehydration and recovered. One monkey also suffered weight loss when he went without food for three days. Bion 11 was launched December 24, 1996, and carried the monkeys Lapik and Multik ("Cartoon") on a 14-day flight.

Tragically, Multik died the day after the capsule recovery during his post-landing medical operation and checkup. Multik's death raised new questions regarding the ethics of using animals for research. NASA has dropped out of participation in a planned Bion 12 mission. From 1983 to the present day, the Space Shuttle has flown over two dozen Spacelab experimental packages in its payload bay. Life-science Spacelab missions have included experiments involving the human astronauts as well as the animals and insects carried on these missions. STS-51-B (Spacelab-3) launched April 29, 1985. STS-61-A (Spacelab-D1) launched October 30, 1985. STS-40 (Spacelab Life Sciences 1 SLS-1) launched June 5, 1991. STS-42 (International Microgravity Laboratory-1 IML-1) launched January 22, 1992.

STS-47 (Spacelab-J), a joint venture between NASA and the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) launched September 12, 1992. STS-65 (IML-2) launched July 8, 1994. A biological payload record was set on April 17, 1998, when over two thousand creatures joined the seven-member crew of the shuttle Columbia (STS-90) for a sixteen-day mission of intensive neurological testing (NEUROLAB). Over the past 50 years, American and Soviet scientists have utilized the animal world for testing. Despite losses, these animals have taught the scientists a tremendous amount more than could have been learned without them. Without animal testing in the early days of the human space program, the Soviet and American programs could have suffered great losses of human life. These animals performed a service to their respective countries that no human could or would have performed. They gave their lives and/or their service in the name of technological advancement, paving the way for humanity's many forays into space. For more information on animal visitors to outer space, you may be interested in the following sites:

Question: What was the third country to put a rocket into space
Answer: France