Shuttle Tests Look to Space Stations of Future : Astronauts Exultant Over Breakthroughs Seen as ‘Springboard’

The seven crew members of the space shuttle Challenger, exultant Saturday after another day of scientific breakthroughs, are performing experiments and living in an environment that will teach scientists how to build the space stations of tomorrow.

“We look at Spacelab as being the springboard for a space station,” said mission manager Joseph Cremin at Johnson Space Center here. “The things we are doing now are prototypes of how we will act in a space station.”

Astronauts aboard the Challenger, which is to land at Edwards Air Force Base at 9:05 a.m. Monday after a weeklong mission, have carried out 14 of 15 scientific experiments--some with only partial success--in the 23-foot-long Spacelab. Only the deployment of a French-built, wide-angle camera was a complete failure because of a mechanical malfunction.

Huge Amounts of Data

Cremin said Saturday that the experiments had already produced enough data to fill almost 9 million sheets of paper, as well as 2.5 million video frames. One experiment alone, designed to dissect the make-up of the Earth’s atmosphere, took 160 million measurements.

Many of the experiments aboard the $1-billion, European-built Spacelab have been designed to see how substances can be manufactured in zero gravity, preparing for the day when astronauts will spend months at a time on a space station.

The target date for putting such a station in orbit, if funding for the project continues and all goes as scheduled, is 1993.

As envisioned by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the space station will be a long, narrow structure, to which shuttle cargo similar to the Spacelab can be attached. Later, more modules can be added and others can be removed for refitting back on Earth, much like a giant set of Tinkertoys.

“It will be sort of like starting off with a mom-and-pop-type airport and ending up with a giant one,” NASA spokesman Charles Redmond said.

Modular Package Form

Experiment packages on the present flight are also designed in modular form so that they can be easily pulled out and replaced by others.

One variety of experiment that could have commercial implications is the growth of crystals in space. Three such projects are being carried out aboard the Spacelab, and the hope is that they can be grown more perfectly in a zero-gravity environment.

If that can be done, it opens up the possibility of making small, lightweight highly sensitive radiation detectors. Now, such machines are bulky because the crystals used must be at low temperatures and require a refrigeration system. The crystals grown in space, if they work, would not need cooling. Dr. George Fichtl, the mission scientist, said the crystals could also have military applications and could, among other things, be used to produce smaller, more efficient heat-seeking missiles.

There have been some minor problems growing the crystals, including a leak in one of the growing containers. The astronauts also said the design of one of the growth containers made it difficult to work with.

“If you’ll schedule me for 15 rounds with the guy that designed this Chinese puzzle, I’d like to discuss it with him,” astronaut Don Lind said.

Another experiment that could have major space applications is one called a Drop Dynamics Module. Designed by astronaut Taylor Wang of Pasadena’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the experiment mixes and rotates water and glycerin solution with the use of sound waves. But the predicted practical application is the mixing and shaping of exotic alloys and lenses, without the use of containers that could cause imperfections, for industrial and military uses.

As scientists envision it, materials that cannot be mixed and shaped on Earth can be mixed and shaped in a weightless environment. The Center for Space Policy, a Cambridge, Mass.-based commercial space study firm, estimates a $5-billion annual revenue by the year 2000 if the process can be perfected.

Space Sickness Control

Other experiments on board that relate directly to space stations include one to control space sickness and another to test how long spaceflights affect the body’s fluid composition.

The two squirrel monkeys and two dozen rats on board also play a role in the space station plans. They, like the astronauts, will be examined in minute detail to see how weightlessness has affected their organs. The rats will be killed after the shuttle touches down so that their organs can be studied. The monkeys will be spared.

When the shuttle lands Monday, it will be piloted by mission commander Robert F. Overmyer, who will take over the controls at 40,000 feet. Co-pilot Frederick D. Gregory will be in the right-hand seat. Other members of the shuttle crew include Norman E. Thagard, William E. Thornton and Lodewijk van den Berg.

Saturday, like the last two days aboard the shuttle, was a good one for the astronauts.

“It’s just going as smooth as glass,” Overmyer said.