2025-10-31 chinadaily.com.cn Editor：Mo Honge
The Shenzhou XXI crew — mission commander Senior Colonel Zhang Lu (heart), spaceflight engineer Major Wu Fei (proper) and payload specialist Zhang Hongzhang — meets the press on Thursday on the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China. (WANG JIANGBO / for China Daily)
China will launch three astronauts into low-Earth orbit on Friday evening to hold out a crew shift onboard its Tiangong area station and undertake a number of scientific assignments, together with the nation’s first in-orbit experimentation on rodents.
A Long March 2F rocket, carrying the manned Shenzhou XXI spaceship, is scheduled to elevate off at 11:44 pm on Friday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China, Zhang Jingbo, a spokesman for the China Manned Space Agency, stated at a information convention held on Thursday morning on the Jiuquan spaceport.
The Shenzhou XXI crew members, led by mission commander Senior Colonel Zhang Lu, 49, will take cost from their Shenzhou XX friends, who’ve been manning the area station for greater than six months, the spokesman stated.
The service rocket’s propellant injection work is ready to start out at its service tower afterward Thursday, whereas different prelaunch preparations are already underway, stated the spokesman, who can be a senior engineer on the area company.
“After the Shenzhou XXI spacecraft enters its preset orbital position, it will activate its rapid autonomous rendezvous-docking mode, and then take about three-and-a-half hours to approach and connect with the front port of the Tianhe core module,” he stated.
The Shenzhou XXI workforce is tasked with working and sustaining the Tiangong area station throughout their six-month keep. This would be the second spaceflight for Zhang Lu, about 29 months after he returned from the Shenzhou XV mission. For his two teammates — spaceflight engineer Major Wu Fei and payload specialist Zhang Hongzhang — will probably be their debut mission.
Wu, 32, would be the fourth Chinese spaceflight engineer to have reached orbit, after Colonel Zhu Yangzhu of the Shenzhou XVI mission, Lieutenant Colonel Wang Haoze of the Shenzhou XIX, and Colonel Wang Jie of the Shenzhou XX.
Wu may even grow to be the youngest Chinese astronaut to have participated in a spaceflight, breaking the file held so lengthy by Lieutenant Colonel Tang Shengjie of the Shenzhou XVII, who made his first journey into area in October 2023 on the age of 33.
Before becoming a member of the People’s Liberation Army Astronaut Division in January 2021, Wu was an engineer on the China Academy of Space Technology in Beijing, specializing in spacecraft temperature management expertise.
Zhang Hongzhang, 39, will grow to be the second Chinese civilian to make it to outer area, in addition to the second Chinese payload specialist to embark on a spaceflight, following Professor Gui Haichao from Beihang University in Beijing, who was a part of the Shenzhou XVI mission.
He can be the primary astronaut picked from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the nation’s prime analysis establishment. His tutorial work is targeted on crucial supplies and equipment for superior batteries.
In-orbit operations
During their orbital keep, the Shenzhou XXI astronauts will perform a number of assignments akin to conducting scientific experiments and purposes, enterprise spacewalks to put in area particles protect gear and different devices, deploying and retrieving gadgets from outdoors the area station, and performing science lectures and different public-benefit actions, in response to the CMSA spokesman.
Specifically, the astronauts are set to open 27 new scientific and technological tasks for in-depth and systematic analysis throughout a number of fields, together with area life sciences and biotechnology, area drugs, area supplies science, microgravity fluid physics and combustion, and new spacecraft applied sciences.
The spokesman stated the Shen-zhou XXI crew will carry out the nation’s first in-orbit experimentation on rodents. Four mice — two females and two males — will fly onboard the spacecraft to the Tiangong area station, the place the affect of the brand new surroundings, which options weightlessness and enclosed area, on their behavioral patterns might be noticed, he stated.
After the mission, the mice will return to Earth with the astronauts for additional observations, together with modifications of their stress responses and a number of tissue and organ variations following their publicity to area, the spokesman added.
Crewed outpost
The Tiangong, which was accomplished in late 2022, is at present the one working area station independently run by a single nation. It orbits Earth at an altitude of about 400 kilometers.
The area station has three everlasting elements — the Tianhe core module and two giant science lab modules known as the Wentian and the Mengtian. It is at present linked with two visiting spacecraft, the Shenzhou XX crew ship and the Tianzhou 9 cargo ship.
With an general weight of about 100 metric tons, the Tiangong is without doubt one of the largest and most advanced buildings ever arrange in area by people.
The orbital outpost has been manned by the Shenzhou XX astronauts — mission commander Senior Colonel Chen Dong, Colonel Chen Zhongrui and Colonel Wang Jie — since their arrival in late April.
The astronauts have carried out many scientific experiments and technological assessments, in addition to 4 spacewalks. They are scheduled to fly again to Earth after spending a number of days with their successors for handover work, the CMSA spokesman stated.
With the Shenzhou XX mission, Chen Dong has grow to be the primary Chinese astronaut to spend greater than 400 days in outer area and make six spacewalks, the spokesman stated.