The International Space Station, an orbiting scientific laboratory, the largest and most technically complex spacecraft ever built by human completed 10 years in space on Thursday.

The orbital assembly of the ISS began with the launch of the Zarya module from Kazakhstan on November 20, 1998.

The project currently involves NASA, Russia's Federal Space Agency, the Canadian Space Agency, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and European Space Agency (ESA).

International Space Station can be seen from Earth with naked eyes, which travels an average speed of 28,000 km/hr at an altitude of 350km from earth's surface and orbits earth 16 times a day, ie every one and half hour it completes one orbit around earth, an astronauts on-board can see 16 sunrise and sunsets every day !

Even though US and Russia planned many space labs during cold war, many of them didn't materialize due to financial and technical reasons.

First ISS module was built in 1998 and is expected to complete the full project by 2011.

The source of electrical power for the ISS is the Sun, light is converted into electricity through the use of solar arrays. At the station's orbital altitude, the gravity from the Earth is 88% of that at sea level.

At present ISS can accommodate only 3 astronauts. Currently docked spacecraft Endeavor brought tons of home improvement materials to the space station to increase its facilities.

It delivered two sleeping quarters, a second toilet, a resistance exercise device and a water purification system, which will increase the capacity to six once the work is over.

More than 1,00,000 people from 16 countries are working daily on ISS related projects.

International Space Station expected to play a major role in future manned missions to moon, mars and other planets.