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Presently, Europe is faced with the task of implementing the Columbus Space Program. In a stepwise approach the Columbus Initial Orbital Configuration will involve eventually into a European (permanently) Manned Space Infrastructure. Towards this goal, various technological challenges arise for the Environmental Control and Life Support System (ECLSS). Some of these have already been identified and are subject of initial investigations. To regain oxygen from the metabolic process, a physico-chemical chain of CO2-concentration, CO2-cracking and water electrolysis is under development. The present status of the preliminary breadboarding, composed of a steam desorbed solid amine concentrator and a Sabatier reactor will be discussed. The third item in this chain, the electrolyser, is not yet implemented in this breadboarding but is under test, demonstrating the technology for regenerative fuel cell application.

Successful implementation of the MELISSA loop requires the optimum performance of each of its compartments. Preliminary studies on the behaviour of the photoheterotrophic compartment have been performed. The previously suggested strains have been tested for growth on the carbon and nitrogen sources expected to be components of the influent. The results indicate that of the organisms tested Rs.rubrum should become the organism of choice for the photoheterotrophic compartment while R.capsulatus is more appropriate for the photoautotrophic anaerobic compartment. Biomass analyses, determination of yields and growth rates have also been performed in the preliminary batch and continuous cultures.

ECOSIM is a software tool for continuous simulation of systems which makes possible a combined representation of different physical aspects of a system, such as fluid flows, chemical reactions, electrical phenomena, and analogue and digital controls, in a single model. ECOSIM is a true modular simulation tool. The user can easily develop re-usable submodels and libraries of parametric components in the ECOSIM language and by taking advantage of the abstractions provided by the program. It is also possible to call FORTRAN or C subroutines. Mathematical modelling is based on an underlying differential algebraic equation solver, which overcomes the common drawbacks of simulators based on ordinary differential equation solvers. This permits very rich equation sets to be employed in the model which in turn opens the door to multi-disciplinary simulation. These capabilities make ECOSIM a very powerful tool for the simulation of Environmental Control and Life Support Systems (ECLSSs).

With the successful retrieval of EURECA, the EUROPEAN RETRIEVABLE CARRIER, again a long term orbit satellite (11 month in space) is available for the space material community to investigate the influence of low earth orbit environment on materials which stayed in orbit for a prolonged time. EURECA, designed, manufactured and launched to carry out numerous experiments in the fields of fluid- and solar physics, materials science, biology and astronomy under orbital conditions, in parallel presents a huge material expositon experiment in itself, providing detailed insight into the possible orbital degradation mechanisms due to the synergistic effects of atomic oxygen, UV radiation, thermal cycling, high vacuum and micrometeorite/debris impacts. In order to exploit the valuable information, an integrated ESTEC/ERNO team has been established to perform a detailed investigation of the EURECA surface and - as far as accessible -internal structural parts and experiments.

ECOSIM, a software tool for the simulation of ECLSS which has been developed for the European Space Agency (ESA), provides a powerful, friendly graphical interface to users. To test and verify the evolutional capability of ECOSIM for the simulation of ECLSS for future missions, and also to clarify the required future improvements to ECOSIM, the ECLSS of a Moon base, in its initial build-up phase, has been modelled and simulated, following the establishment of the necessary new component mathematical models, including biological ones.

After 11 months of successful operation onboard the ISS US laboratory Destiny, the air quality monitors ANITA (Analyzing Interferometer for Ambient Air) was brought back to Earth on STS126 (ULF2). ANITA is a technology demonstrator flight experiment for continuous air quality monitoring inside the crewed cabin of the ISS with low detection limits and high time resolution. For the first time, the dynamics of the detected trace gas concentrations could be directly resolved by ANITA and correlated to gas events in the cabin. The system is the result of a long term ESA technology development programme initiated more than seventeen years ago. The ANITA mission was a cooperative project between ESA and NASA. ESA's responsibilities were the provision of the H/W, the data acquisition and the data evaluation. NASA was responsible for the launch, accommodation and operation onboard ISS, data download and the transportation of ANITA back to the Earth.