Chinese Astronauts Beam 1st Science Lesson from Space (Video)

China's 1st Space Lecture Preparations #2
A video screengrab shows the Chinese astronauts aboard space station Tiangong-1 prepare for the space lecture to be delivered by Wang Yaping on June 20, 2013. (Image credit: CCTV)

Life in space is fun, and the three Chinese astronauts currently in orbit have shared their first lesson on space living with students and countrymen on Earth.

The Shenzhou 10 astronauts (or "taikonauts") beamed down China's first live space science lesson video to 330 elementary and middle-school children in Beijing from their position onboard the nation's Tiangong 1 space module. More than 60 million students and teachers also watched the televised broadcast from around China, according to the state-run news agency Xinhua.

Nie Haisheng and Wang Yaping — the second Chinese woman to fly to space — demonstrated the high points of weightlessness during the lecture while Zhang Xiaoguang photographed the lesson, which was broadcast live on China's state-run CCTV news channel. [Photos: China's Shenzhou 10 Space Mission in Pictures]

This screengrab from television taken on June 20, 2013 shows female astronaut Wang Yaping, one of the three crew members of Shenzhou-10 spacecraft, making a water ball in space during a lecture to students on Earth, aboard China's space module Tiangong-1. (Image credit: Xinhua)

 

"In a weightless environment, we are very skillful marshal artists," Wang said after Nie floated around the lab in various positions.

Wang showed the students how water behaves in space, creating a bubble of liquid to demonstrate the properties of surface tension while in microgravity.

"Okay everybody, this is where magic happens," Wang said as she held up a bubble of water trapped within a metal ring.

Wang engaged the students by asking questions throughout the nearly hourlong lecture. Students discussed how they weigh themselves on Earth before the taikonaut demonstrated how the space flyers weigh objects in microgravity.

The astronauts also took questions from their student audience.

This screengrab from television taken on June 20, 2013 shows female astronaut Wang Yaping, one of the three crew members of Shenzhou-10 spacecraft, giving a lecture to students on Earth aboard China's space module Tiangong-1. (Image credit: Xinhua)

"Do you enjoy any view that's different from what you can see on the Earth?" one student asked Wang. "Do the stars twinkle, and do you see the UFOs?"

"From the window, we can see the beautiful Earth and the sun, the moon and the stars, but we haven't seen the UFO," Wang said. "As we are now in outer space without the atmosphere, we can see the stars shining brightly, but they do not twinkle."

China's Shenzhou 10 crew launched into orbit on June 11 for a 15-day stint in space. Tiangong 1 is expected to remain in service for another three months, after which it will be deorbited or destroyed, experts have said.

This trip marks China's fifth manned spaceflight. China's first astronaut, Yang Liwei, launched into orbit in 2003, making China the third nation to launch astronauts into space using its own vehicles after Russia and the United States.

The Tiangong 1 space lab has been orbiting Earth since September 2011 and is considered China's first step on the way toward building a large space laboratory by about 2020.

Follow Miriam Kramer on Twitter and Google+. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Original article on SPACE.com.

Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: community@space.com.

Miriam Kramer
Staff Writer

Miriam Kramer joined Space.com as a Staff Writer in December 2012. Since then, she has floated in weightlessness on a zero-gravity flight, felt the pull of 4-Gs in a trainer aircraft and watched rockets soar into space from Florida and Virginia. She also served as Space.com's lead space entertainment reporter, and enjoys all aspects of space news, astronomy and commercial spaceflight.  Miriam has also presented space stories during live interviews with Fox News and other TV and radio outlets. She originally hails from Knoxville, Tennessee where she and her family would take trips to dark spots on the outskirts of town to watch meteor showers every year. She loves to travel and one day hopes to see the northern lights in person. Miriam is currently a space reporter with Axios, writing the Axios Space newsletter. You can follow Miriam on Twitter.