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Astronauts air on commission expanse shuttle Endeavour's final assignment proclaimed gathering of the International Space Station rank this past week, but thanks to a primary conveying being left at the orbiting laboratory, the send crew's gathering impact has meet begun.

Packed on Endeavour for the activate to expanse and transferred to the expanse send during the shuttle's cropped stay were 30 unassembled LEGO toy models — including a expanse shuttle and a custom-designed copy of the International Space Station (ISS) itself.

Crew members module physique the not-so-miniature LEGO ISS aboard the full-scale — and now fully-complete — station. [Amazing Spacewalk Photos of Space Station, Endeavour]

"On behalf of the STS-134 gathering and Expedition [28] crew, expanse send gathering is complete," said Endeavour's commander Mark Kelly on weekday after two spacewalking astronauts additional the a robotic limb spreading boom to the outdoor of the station.

Earlier during the STS-134 assignment — the last for the 30-year expanse shuttle information — Endeavour additional to the send a newborn spare parts platform and the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a $2 1000000000 science experiment examining basic issues most matter and the lineage and the scheme of the universe.

With their send gathering impact completed, Endeavour's sextet astronauts departed the ISS New on Sun evening, leaving behindhand the LEGO-version of the orbiting outpost for the station's gathering to build. [Gallery: Building the International Space Station]

Building the future

The LEGO models, including the expanse station, module be used in eight educational activities that module be conducted by ISS gathering members and prefabricated acquirable to educators crossways the United States to apply in room curricula.

The LEGO Bricks in Space send is conception of an outreach and educational information matured low the partnership between NASA and the LEGO Group to enliven children to explore science, technology, engineering, and math.

"Education outreach is a bounteous conception of what we do at NASA," send grace engineer Daffo Garan told collectSPACE from orbit Thursday. "Just the fact that we are air in expanse and the awful things we are doing in expanse are rattling inspiring. I know when I was a kid I was inspired by the expanse program."

"We hit lots of different methods [to do] educational outreach, [LEGO is] digit of them. I conceive that's digit of the reasons we hit the expanse station, to enliven the next generation," said Garan.

On commission the ISS, Garan and his man astronauts module explore the personalty of microgravity on simple machines by antiquity models, conducting experiments, and distribution those results with students and teachers backwards on Earth finished recording and gathering commentary. Each state module hit a teacher's guide and enrollee worksheet so that the aforementioned activities crapper be conducted by students on Earth and the results compared and contrasted.

The LEGO Bricks in Space send encompasses models from the LEGO CITY Space Port line acquirable in stores now with corresponding activities much as a LEGO journeying of the expanse shuttle and International Space Station. The 30 models also include tools, same a Trundle wheel used as a measuring device, and space-only sets much as vignettes display scenes exclusive the expanse station's modules.

Continue reading at collectSPACE.com most how astronauts train to physique LEGOs in expanse and why the LEGO International Space Station crapper be found only in space.

You crapper follow collectSPACE on Twitter @collectSPACE and editor parliamentarian Pearlman @robertpearlman. Copyright 2011 collectSPACE.com. All rights reserved.

• Amazing Spacewalk Photos: Shuttle Endeavour at Space Station
• Inside and Out: The International Space Station
• Building the International Space Station

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