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The Buddy System

For astronauts on the ISS, a new robot means fewer risky spacewalks

Replacing a circuit breaker in a dark basement is one thing. But what if you had to climb around the outside of a spacecraft orbiting hundreds of miles above the Earth to do it? This kind of dangerous maintenance work has become fairly common for astronauts aboard the International Space Station, where they spend as much time fixing the $100-billion-plus orbiting science lab as they do performing actual research.

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December 2009: Best of What's New

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