It's a combination of science, maintenance, and general housekeeping. And then, occasionally, robotics activities or a spacewalk you might get to do.
This is a really big space station. We do a lot of various kinds of work here, different kinds of science experiments; we have over 400 different experiments going on at any one time in different areas, from basic science research to medical technology, that hopefully will benefit more people on Earth.
People do really well on space missions, but it's the physiological, the medical stuff, the stuff like radiation, loss of bone mass and muscle mass and density. It's those things that we need to figure out.
I am humbled and excited by new opportunities for me to support and share the amazing work NASA is doing to help us travel farther into the solar system and work with the next generation of science and technology leaders.
Space has its own unique smell. So whenever a vehicle docks, or if guys are out doing a spacewalk, the smell of space when you open up the hatch is very distinct. It's kind of like a burning-metal smell, if you can imagine what that would smell like.
What we look for are people that are technically competent. You need a background in a scientific field, whether it's as a scientist, an engineer, medical doctor, or, you know, a person that's in the military with some kind of technical background.
I went to the University of Maryland for a year and was considering maybe, you know, being a medical doctor but decided my other interest was maybe flying airplanes in the Navy and just kind of changed my mind and changed schools and changed majors and decided to focus a hundred percent on that.