News

Lexus of space station labs poised for launch

(AP) -- Japan is about to roll out the Lexus of space station labs, a whopper in size and sophistication. The $1 billion Kibo lab - which means "hope" in Japanese - is poised for a Saturday launch aboard space shuttle Discovery. It will be the biggest and, by far, the most elaborate room at the international space station - a 37-foot-long scientific workshop as large as a school bus, with its own hatch to the outside for experiments and a pair of robot arms. Making it even bigger will be a closet and porch.