Lexus In Space

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Japan is about to roll out the Lexus
of space station labs, a whopper in size and sophistication.
The $1 billion Kibo lab - which means "hope" in Japanese - is
poised for a Saturday launch aboard space shuttle Discovery.
It will be the biggest and, by far, the most elaborate room at
the international space station. It's a 37-foot-long scientific
workshop as large as a school bus, with its own hatch to the
outside for experiments and a pair of robot arms. Making it even
bigger will be a closet and porch.
Kibo is so enormous that three shuttle flights were needed to
get it all up.
Seven astronauts, one of them Japanese, will deliver the actual
lab on the upcoming mission, along with the larger of the two robot
arms.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)