China sent three astronauts into space this week as part of the Shenzhou-16 mission, bound for the Tiangong space station. Among them is the first civilian scientist in history, Gui Haichao.
jinhaipeng is the commander and Zhu Yangzu, the mission engineer, as explained by AFP.
Born in 1986, Gui Haichao is a professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Beihang University. Unlike the classmates of him and his predecessorswas not part of the People’s Liberation Army Astronaut Corps.
His work in Shenzhou-16 is to carry out experiments, explained a spokesman for China’s Human Space Agency.
Professor Gui Haichao will study “new quantum phenomena, high-precision time-frequency space systems, verification of general relativity and the origin of life”.
Every resident astronaut at the Tiangong space station will be replaced by China
The three taikonauts (as is the name given by China to its astronauts) traveled aboard the Long March 2F rocket, from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Station, in the northwest of the country.
It is the first mission to visit Tiangong Station since it started its “application and development” phase.
In the orbiting laboratory are three other resident astronauts, Fei Junlong, Zhang Lu and Deng Qingming, who have already spent 6 months in space and will return to Earth in the next few days.
China’s great aspiration, as AFP points out, is the establishment of a base on the Moon. The country’s National Administration announced that it plans to send a manned lunar mission before 2030.
It will be the direct competition of NASA’s Artemis III Mission, which hopes to carry the first woman, Christina Koch, to the natural satellite. For Artemis II, Koch and his three companions will travel to the orbit of the Moon.