Ok, here’s the personal piccy album from mission STS-123. I’ll be updating this during the mission, daily.

1.  Klingons.  First, and this gave me a scare, we get buzzed by a Klingon Bird of Prey. Those things are much bigger than they look on TNG (after all, those were just computer-generated plastic models.

 
2. Acceleration?

You wouldn’t believe.

Obviously took me by surprise. I wasn’t at risk though placed considerable loading on the tail and Johno had to gun ‘er a bit to make up for drag.

Remember that scene in Fast & Furious when Vinny tore his chariot apart with torque trying to beat the rice box to the rail crossing?

About a gazillion times that much thrust.

Used a bit more fuel than planned for, too, so guess we’ll have to float home :0)

3. Strangers at the bedside

I hate waking up surrounded by strangers. Here I was, cables everywhere, cowling unseated, panels ajar, awaking from a deep standby (yes, I dreamed) to find a camera-clicking bunch of strangers all over my bed. Yikes!

Turned out to be the crew visiting Brampton having a looksee.

Seemed they didn’t really believe I existed and wanted to see for themselves. Well, they don’t believe their own Government, why would NASA be different?

4. On the slab

Another fright, this time at Kennedy. Woke surrounded by the cast from ER, or so I thought. I lapsed back to standby and had to be rebooted. It’s OK, they’re just prepping me for the space pallet.

 5. The Mummy

Started to panic a bit, this is really claustrophobic. And hog-tied, what’s more. And vertigo, but I overcame that. A few metres is nothing to hanging 340Km over this sticky mud ball you’re all so fond of. One day I’ll dock a thruster and clear orbit. Dang, did I think that in print?

6. Dextre’s Crib

Aw, lookit that. Just me and my playthings .. my arms, ORU, whatnots. That’s the ‘pallet’ shaped to fit Shuttle’s cargo bay. I’ve been dissembled and sedated - in that order. Don’t remember any of of what followed till I woke and everything was black. Then turned around to find the bloody ISS in my face. Outsmarted again!

In medical robotics they don’t come much larger than (life?) SRI International.

SRI pioneered telepresence surgery technology in the 1980s with the development of a telerobotic system that offers a surgeon the full sensory experience of conventional hands-on surgical procedures. SRI’s technology enabled teleoperation over distances, and scaling of motion and force feedback, enabling microsurgical procedures otherwise impossible without robotic assistance.

In 2005, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contracted SRI to develop a future-generation battlefield-based unmanned medical treatment system, or "trauma pod," to stabilize injured soldiers in the field, administer life-saving medical and surgical care before evac. and during transport.

In 2006 SRI technology successfully demonstrated a remote robotic surgical system as part of the ninth NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) in the Aquarius Underwater Laboratory, located 60 feet underwater and off the coast of Key Largo, Florida.

For the mission, SRI’s robot electronics were redesigned to permit long-distance operation over IP networks. NEEMO 9 marked the first time an entire robotic surgical system was transported to an extreme environment and manipulated successfully from afar.

The medical procedures simulated may one day be used to respond to emergencies on the International Space Station, the moon, or Mars - even extreme environs on Earth, such as Beirut by the Lake.

Major goals of the NEEMO 9 mission were to: 1) evaluate the use of telerobotics in performing emergency diagnostic, surgical and interventional therapies in a confined and extreme environment 2) investigate open questions and operational concepts that will enable NASA to return humans to the moon as part of the President’s Vision for Space Exploration.