The International Space Station completes the 100,000th rotation around the Earth

17 years since being launched into space in 1998, the International Space Station (ISS) has just completed the 100,000th roundabout around Earth on May 16.

The US Aeronautics Agency (NASA) announces this milestone earlier this week and explains the 2.6-billion-mile route ISS completed is equivalent to 10 rounds of Mars or how close it is to the distance Marine kingdom.

ISS is a cooperative result of 16 countries including the US, Canada, Japan, Russia, Brazil, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden and the UK. .

Every 90 minutes around the globe, the astronauts on ISS (now 222) have the opportunity to see spectacular sunrise and sunset every 45 minutes.

ISS International Space Station - cooperative results of 16 countries.(Photo: CNN).

The work space and pressure inside ISS are similar to the Boeing 747. The International Space Station weighs about 450,000kg and is the size of a football field.

ISS has long been part of a lot of space research projects, such as the Twins project when Scott Kelly's astronaut performs a 340-day record on space to study long-term effects. of space onto the human body. More recently is the Veggie project when successful scientists cultivate fish lettuce on the ISS in August 2015.

Currently, research groups are conducting experiments to measure the strength of rats' claws to find ways to prevent muscle and bone weakness after long periods of living in space.

Former NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao - now a special adviser to the program - says ISS is the key to breaking the next line: bringing people to Mars. "The biggest challenge is biomedical: how to keep astronauts healthy on the way and back from Mars as well as on the surface of the planet," said Chiao.

"There are a lot of changes that happen to the human body in space, but the most important thing is that once you get out of the Earth's atmosphere, you have to be more exposed to radiation," Chiao said.

Meanwhile, astronaut Jeff Williams, currently on ISS, has sent a message to celebrate: "The 100,000th rotation and the journey continues".