Evelyn Husband and her mate, Rick, had always planned to visit Israel. When Rick was assigned to NASA's STS-107 mission, the resolve was strengthened by the fact that one of his crewmates, Ilan Ramon, was Israel's first man in space. But those plans disintegrated along with the shuttle when it fell from the skies over Texas last year. Last week, however, several family members who lost their loved ones aboard the last flight of Columbia were in Israel, planting a tree in memory of the STS-107 crew.

What's this? Russia is designing a replacement for the venerable Soyuz spacecraft (below), a mainstay of Russian and Soviet aerospace since the 1960s? Da.

Heading into the homestretch of their 6½-month mission aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 8 Commander Michael Foale and Flight Engineer Alexander Kaleri spent the week conducting biomedical experiments and performing maintenance on a key Station component. Foale and Kaleri spent two days replacing a liquids unit and a water flow system in the Russian Elektron oxygen-generation device in the Zvezda Service Module after weeks of troubleshooting efforts failed to coax it back into service. The Elektron produces oxygen for the Station atmosphere through electrolysis – the separation of hydrogen and oxygen from water that flows through a series of pumps and valves. The hydrogen is vented overboard.