Samantha Cristoforetti has become Italy's first woman astronaut, arriving at the International Space Station (ISS) Monday for six months of experiments and experiences.
Milan-born Cristoforetti, 37, blasted off from Kazakstan and rocketed into space aboard the Soyuz spacecraft late on Sunday before docking at the ISS early Monday.
She is scheduled to remain for six months aboard the space station, taking part in some 200 experiments dealing with such subjects as the effects of microgravity on cells.
Three spacewalks are also scheduled for the crew.
"Everything went fine," Cristoforetti told her mother in her first link from the ISS to mission control in Moscow.
"We saw spectacular images, the dawn and the stars".
When her mother asked if space was all Cristoforetti had dreamt of, the astronaut replied: "much better", to the delight of her colleagues.
Cristoforetti traveled on the Soyuz with two crewmates, Russian Anton Shkaplerov and American Terry W. Virts, who followed her historic step onto the ISS.
"Now Samantha Cristoferetti and her crewmates can enjoy a bit of relaxation," said Luca Parmitano, European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut and ambassador during the Italian duty presidency of the European Union.
Parmitano, who traveled to the ISS himself last year, provided live commentary for ANSA which was streamed during the spacecraft Soyuz's docking at the ISS.
Cristoferetti, Shkaplerov and Virts joined three other crew members who arrived at the ISS in September: Commander Barry Wilmore of NASA and Alexander Samoukutyaev and Elena Serova of Roscosmos, the Russian Federal Space Agency.
Expedition 42 is made up of these six astronauts who will work together on the ISS until March 2015.
Virts will become commander in March 2015 when Wilmore, Samoukutyaev and Serova return home.
Virts, Shkaplerov and Cristoforetti are scheduled to leave the ISS in May 2015. Cristoforetti, who was raised in the Trento region of northern Italy, earned a master's degree in mechanical engineering in the German city of Munich and is a captain in the Italian Air Force. She wrote her master's thesis in solid rocket propellants during a 10-month research stay at the Mendeleev University of Chemical Technologies in Moscow.
As well, as part of her training at the Italian Air Force Academy, she completed a bachelor's degree in aeronautical sciences at Naples Federico II University in 2005.
From 2005 to 2006, she was based at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas, according to the EPA.
After completing Euro-NATO joint jet pilot training, she became a fighter pilot and was assigned to the 132nd Squadron, 51st Bomber Wing, based in Istrana in Italy's Veneto region.
Among the many experiments that await the astronaut team are 10 Italian research projects including a 3D printer that could allow future researchers to manufacture certain kinds of spare equipment and an espresso coffee machine for research into the behavior of liquids.
Nutrition and health are key interests of Cristoforetti and are at the core of her research activities.
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