Starlab has completed five development and design objectives for its NASA-supported commercial space station, which aligns with the agency’s efforts to transition and expand its presence in the commercial low Earth orbit landscape.
Learn more about the Starlab Space Station and other air and space initiatives by attending the Potomac Officers Club’s 2025 Air and Space Summit, which will take place on July 31.
Starlab Design & Development Reviews
The agency said Wednesday that Starlab finished the preliminary design review and safety review that assessed the architecture and systems of the planned space station, which is intended to have a service module and habitat. This clears the way for the development of a detailed design and hardware that will undergo a critical design review during the latter part of 2025 to determine the space station’s design maturity before fabrication and assembly.
The company also started building a mockup of the space station for human-in-the-loop testing. This is where realistic simulations or walkthroughs will help evaluate the station’s interior design and hardware, and develop crew training, procedures and in-flight problem solving. The mockup will be located in NASA Johnson’s Space Vehicle Mockup Facility.
Starlab also wrapped up reviews covering its system design architecture, procurement plan and docking system design of Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft, which will provide cargo logistics services to Starlab.
The recent development builds upon the four reviews completed in December 2024, including the habitat structural test article preliminary design, systems integration, integrated operations and a habitat structural test plan. All completed reviews are part of the NASA Space Act Agreement awarded in 2021.
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