International Space Station (ISS)

Expedition Five crewmembers include (left to right) Cosmonaut Verleri Korzun, Commander; Astronaut Peggy Whitson, flight engineer; and Cosmonaut Sergei Treschev, flight engineer. Launched aboard the Space Shuttle Orbiter Endeavour, STS-111, in April 2002, Expedition Five replaced Expedition Four on the International Space Station (ISS) for a scheduled 4-month mission. Expedition Five carried several new experiments and science facilities to the ISS. The research compliment included 24 new and continuing investigations:10 human life sciences studies, 6 in microgravity, 5 in space product development, and 3 sponsored by the Office of Space Flight. The new experiments are expected to lead to new insights in the fields of materials, plant science, commercial biotechnology, and the long term effects of space flight on humans. 280 hours will be devoted to research in addition to the continuing building of the ISS. Station science will also be conducted by the ever-present ground crew, with a new cadre of controllers for Expedition Five in the ISS Payload Operations Control Center (POCC) at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Controllers work in three shifts around the clock, 7 days a week, in the POCC, the world's primary science command post for the Space Station. The POCC links Earth-bound researchers around the world with their experiments and crew aboard the Space Station.