Who is Kate Rubins? Nasa astronaut ready for first journey into space
Former virologist will attempt to carry out DNA sequencing onboard the International Space Station

Nasa astronaut Kathleen "Kate" Rubins is making final preparations for her first ever journey into space for a four-month stint in orbit on the International Space Station (ISS).
On 24 June, she and her two fellow mission members, Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin and Japan's Takuya Onishi, will blast off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft as part of Expedition 48/49.
Part of their research on the ISS will focus on DNA and they are hoping to carry out genetic sequencing in space.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
"Sequencing DNA on the ISS will enable Nasa to see what happens to genetic material in space in real time, rather than looking at a snapshot of DNA before launch and another snapshot of DNA after launch and filling in the blanks," Rubins told Scientific American.
Rubins, Ivanishin and Onishi are scheduled to return to Earth on 30 October, after four months aboard the space station.
Born in Connecticut, Rubins grew up in Napa, California, and studied molecular biology at the University of California. After further studies at Stanford, she joined the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where she helped develop the first model of smallpox infection.
Following this, she headed the Rubins Lab at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, where she and 14 researchers studied viral diseases affecting Central and West Africa. She was recruited into Nasa's 20th class of potential astronauts in 2009.
In 2013, she told Nature magazine that space travel was one of those "childhood dreams" of which she couldn't let go.
"I thought that Nasa didn't take biologists and so nothing would come of it," she said. "But I knew I would regret it if I did not apply."
According to her Nasa profile, Rubins enjoys "cycling, swimming, flying, scuba diving and reading", as well as parachuting alongside her husband, Michael Magnani.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
Democrats: The 2028 race has begun
Feature Democratic primaries have already kicked off in South Carolina
-
The Pentagon's missing missiles
Feature The U.S. military is low on weapons. Can it restock before a major conflict breaks out?
-
Rescissions: Trump's push to control federal spending
Feature The GOP passed a bill to reduce funding for PBS, NPR and other public media stations
-
Answers to how life on Earth began could be stuck on Mars
Under the Radar Donald Trump plans to scrap Nasa's Mars Sample Return mission – stranding test tubes on the Red Planet and ceding potentially valuable information to China
-
The treasure trove of platinum on the moon
Under the radar This kind of bounty could lead to commercial exploitation
-
Why Elon Musk's satellites are 'dropping like flies'
Under The Radar Fierce solar activity destroying Starlink satellites
-
Why is Nasa facing a crisis?
Today's Big Question Trump administration proposes 25% cut to national space agency's budget in 'extinction-level event'
-
Full moon calendar 2025: when is the next full moon?
In depth When to see the lunar phenomenon every month
-
How to see the Lyrid meteor shower
The explainer A nice time to look to the skies
-
Katy Perry, Gayle King visit space on Bezos rocket
Speed Read Six well-known women went into lower orbit for 11 minutes
-
Space ads could be coming to a sky near you
Under the radar Making space for commercial profits