Inflatable spacecraft blossoms in orbit

An inflatable spacecraft launched Thursday from Russia has successfully extended its solar panels, says the U.S. company running the project.

Pictures on the website of Bigelow Aerospace of Las Vegas show the panels extended at the front and back of the craft, the second launched by the company.

Genesis IIwas about4.4 metres long and1.9 metres across at launch, but air expansion blows it up to about 2.5metres in diameter once it's in orbit.

The craft is designed to test systems for future manned commercial space modules that Bigelow plans. Themodule is aone-third scale model of the eventual modules. Several couldbe linked to make a space station.

GenesisI and II are identical on the outside, but Genesis II hasadditional sensors and avionics. It has 22 video cameras inside and outside, comparedto 13 on the first craft.

The modules have an expandable outer surface, with several layers of impact-resistant materials, wrapped around a central core with about 11.5 cubic metres of usable volume.

Genesis II carried paying freight,items and pictures the public paid to send into space in the company's Fly your Stuff program. It hopes to photograph the photos and items in orbit, and display them onits site.

It also plans to run a space bingo game on Genesis II "as a fun activity for the public."

Genesis Iwas launched on July 12, 2006, and is still sending data and images from Earth orbit, the company said. It circles the Earth every 96 minutes and it could last up to 13 years.

Both craft were launchedon Dnepr rockets from the ISC Kosmotras Yasny Cosmodrome inthe Orenburg region of Russia.

Robert Bigelow, who has run financial and real estate businesses, has invested $100 million US in Bigelow Aerospace and is prepared toput $500 million US into space stations by 2015, theBigelow website said.