Starlab Space Venture May Add Alpine Country To Club

Starlab Space, a Houston, Texas-based joint venture developing a next-gen commercial space station joining others after the International Space Station is decommissioned in the early 2030s, announced a partnership with the Center for Space and Aviation Switzerland and Lichtenstein, or CSA, to conduct part of its activities at Innovation Park Zurich, bringing the mountainous land of skiers, precision clocks, and cheese into the circle of spacefaring nations.

In Zurich, Switzerland’s largest city, the partnership will carry out research and development activities related to biotechnology, biomedicine, and pharmacology elements of the space station project. It will also institute a payload development center.

The new space stations being developed will be smaller than the ISS but less expensive to build and operate. Many will be focused on R&D of industrial processes in microgravity, and the construction costs are expected to decrease as more and more are built over the coming decades.

Starlab Space is itself a joint venture formed by Voyager as the leader, along with partners Airbus, Mitsubishi, MDA Space, Palantir, and Northop Grumman. The Hilton hotel group will also participate in the design of hospitality aspects of the station.

Professor Oliver Ullrich is Chairman of the Center for Space and Aviation Switzerland and Lichtenstein. He is coordinating the project on the Swiss and European side.

Emphasizing the relevance of Swiss bioscience and its contributions to the project, Prof. Ullrich said, “We have the universities, the qualified workforce and the commitment from the authorities that have decided to make of space one of the top sectors to develop within the 2050-time horizon.”

He also pointed out that over 60% of the research performed on the ISS has been biotech or medical-related. He also noted that various processes are done more efficiently in the microgravity of space, such as cell growth and proliferation, crystallization, and mixtures of substances for medical treatments.

Ullrich continued, explaining, “If transportation costs are low enough, many of these processes can be done more efficiently in space, but the output is likely to be time sensitive as well. This is the case, for example, if you are growing cells or creating chemical compounds which will be used to treat people back on Earth. So, we need a way to move things on a regular and timely basis between the station(s) and Earth, at least once per week.”

Stay tuned, as things are getting ever more exciting in the development of space activities. Even in Switzerland!

FMI:  spacevalley.ch/