The International Space Station celebrates its 20th anniversary. History is still being made.

Written By Radhika Vaishnav
On November 2nd, the international space station (ISS) completed 20 years of continuous human habitation. The first crew that was present on the ISS was Expedition 1 crew, namely, William Shepherd of NASA along with flight engineers of Roscosmos, Sergei Krikalev and Yuri Gidzenko. In recent developments, Chris Cassidy, Ivan Vagner and Anatoly Ivanishin returned safely back to Earth after 196 days on the ISS. To date, 241 humans have visited the ISS. Most recently, Expedition 64 reached the ISS in October, and were joined by the four crew members of the historic Space X team in November. 
Remarkably, over these 20 years, astronauts performed over 3,000 experiments at the ISS. In the year 2000, when human habitation of the ISS began, it was speculated that this would be an exercise of not much significance. Over these past two decades, activities for scientific advancement have been diverse and have included the fields of Earth and Space Sciences, Physical Sciences, Health and human life, Biology, Biotechnology, Technological advances and Educational activities. Over the years, the equipment on the ISS has been enhanced to enable experiments. A number of studies done are on the influence of microgravity on real world problems. This is to not only to understand what life in space would entail, but also to discover new solutions and innovations that can be applied on Earth.
A notable experiment included an identical twin study, in which one astronaut stayed on Earth while the other twin went to the ISS in 2015-2016. The adaptations of the human body to life in space for a prolonged period (in this case, 1 year) could be compared between the identical twins Scott and Mark Kelley. Since identical twins are genetically matched, it made it possible to draw conclusions about the impact of staying at the ISS on parameters such as immune, heart, vision, brain or gut health. The good news was that no significant impact to health was seen after one full year. Whatever changes did occur were seen to return to normal after returning to earth.
Bibliography
Conner, Katie. “NASA Astronaut Chris Cassidy Lands Back on Earth.” CNET, CNET, 22 Oct. 2020, www.cnet.com/news/nasa-astronaut-chris-cassidy-lands-back-on-earth/. 
Garcia, Mark. “Crew Studies Life Science Ahead of 20 Years Milestone.” NASA, NASA, 26 Oct. 2020, blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/2020/10/26/crew-studies-life-science-ahead-of-20-years-milestone/. 
Garcia, Mark. “Expedition 64.” NASA, NASA, 12 Aug. 2020, www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition64/index.html. 
Garrett-Bakelman, Francine E., et al. “The NASA Twins Study: A Multidimensional Analysis of a Year-Long Human Spaceflight.” Science, American Association for the Advancement of Science, 12 Apr. 2019, science.sciencemag.org/content/364/6436/eaau8650. 
Witze, Alexandra. “Astronauts Have Conducted Nearly 3,000 Science Experiments Aboard the ISS.” Nature News, Nature Publishing Group, 3 Nov. 2020, www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-03085-8.
Radhika Vaishnav

Radhika Vaishnav, Ph.D. is a molecular biologist and certified National Geographic Educator who loves to bring the wonders of nature to her pen and canvas. 

She has published her research in various areas of biology and medicine in scientific journals. Her training as a biologist began with her undergraduate in Zoology, and continued with a Masters’ in Molecular Biology and Ph.D. in Physiology. Her various research projects included learning about genes that make a cell cancerous, understanding lifespan of humans and animals, learning about the sense of smell, understanding how water moves around in and out of cells, learning about how chemicals can damage living cells and studying the fascinating ways in which plants and bacteria can interact with animals.

Radhika developed an interest in nature and writing at a very young age. After 15 years of active teaching and research in academia in biomedical sciences, she began to get more involved in science communication. The need to involve the community in scientific discoveries through outreach and writing, as well as inspire people to be more curious and inquisitive has become her goal for the years ahead. She also has a passion for travel and photography and has visited several countries as well almost all 50 of the United States.

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