This story was updated at 6:07 p.m. EDT.
A set of high-tech Japanese underwear has
passed the ultimate smell test in space.
Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata put
the new underwear, which is designed to keep
foul odors down in space, and other garb to an extra-long endurance test
during his 4 1/2-month stay aboard the International Space Station.
"I wore it for about a month and my
station crewmembers never complained for that month, so I think the experiment
went fine," Wakata told the Associated Press Thursday in a televised interview.
Wakata is returning
to Earth on NASA's space shuttle Endeavour, which is due to land Friday
after an 11-day stay at the space station. Before leaving the station,
Wakata told Japanese dignitaries, students and reporters that he spent two months in all
wearing the experimental space clothing designed by the Japan Aerospace
Exploration Agency.
Called J-Wear, the souped-up space
duds include underwear, shirts, socks, pants and shorts made from a special
anti-bacterial fabric engineered to repel static and neutralize odors.
"We're going to go beyond the moon someday," said Mike Suffredini, NASA's space station program manager, in a televised briefing Thursday. "And little things like this will seem like really, really big things when you're far away from Mother Earth."
Japan's experimental underwear made their space debut when
Japanese astronaut Takao Doi wore the clothing during his two-week flight in
March 2008. But Wakata's mission is to first to put the clothes to a month-long
odor test. He packed them in his luggage before leaving the space station so
they can be analyzed by scientists on Earth.
"I'm returning that, and we'll see
the results after landing," said Wakata, who watched over Japan's giant
Kibo lab while aboard the station. He also preformed a series of fun experiments
to show Japan's public how astronauts can fold clothes, ride a "flying carpet,"
enjoy weightlessness and use eyedrops in space.
Wakata and his Endeavour crewmates
are due to land in Florida at 10:48 a.m. EDT (1448 GMT) Friday, weather
permitting. The astronauts spent today checking their spacecraft's flight
control systems and deploying two sets of small satellites for researchers on
Earth.
During Endeavour's 16-day mission,
astronauts replaced Wakata's spot on the station with NASA astronaut Tim Kopra.
They performed five challenging spacewalks to deliver vital spare parts and a new
experiment porch for Japan's Kibo laboratory.
SPACE.com is providing continuous
coverage of STS-127 with reporter Clara Moskowitz and senior editor Tariq Malik
in New York. Click here
for mission updates and SPACE.com's live NASA TV video feed.
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