Source: Xinhua  2016-12-15

Four Chinese volunteers on Wednesday concluded their 180-day stay in a sealed space capsule in south China's Shenzhen City, testing technology intended for space exploration.

The volunteers -- three men and one woman -- were selected from 2,110 candidates after the Astronaut Center of China launched a call for volunteers in May last year. The sealed capsule, with a floor space of 370 square meters, is divided into eight compartments, including the passenger compartment, resource compartment and greenhouse compartments.

Over the past six months, 99 percent of water, 70 percent food and all oxygen the volunteers consumed have been recycled inside the capsule. Data has been collected on growth rates of the plants and the emotional, intellectual and physical condition of the volunteers during the experiment.

According to a senior scientist with the China Manned Space Engineering project, the scheduled target of the test is reached and the test has deepened the understanding of the life support system, and given a basis to design tasks for the space station.

Date:2016-12-15