Andre Kuipers. Credit: NASA

PERSONAL DATA: Born October 5, 1958, in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. He has two daughters. Enjoys flying, scuba diving, skiing, hiking, travelling and history.

EDUCATION: In 1977, Andre Kuipers graduated from Van der Waals Lyceum (now Amstel Lyceum), Amsterdam. Received a Medical Doctor degree from the University of Amsterdam in 1987.

ORGANIZATIONS: Member of the Aerospace Medical Association, the Dutch Aviation Medicine Society and the Dutch Association for Spaceflight

EXPERIENCE: During his medical studies, Andre Kuipers worked in the Vestibular Department of the Academic Medical Centre in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, where he was involved in research on the equilibrium system.

In 1987 and 1988, as an officer of the Royal Netherlands Air Force Medical Corps, he studied accidents and incidents caused by spatial disorientation of pilots of high-performance aircraft.

In 1989 and 1990, he worked for the Research and Development department of the Netherlands Aerospace Medical Centre in Soesterberg. He was involved in research on the Space Adaptation Syndrome, contact lenses for pilots, vestibular apparatus, blood pressure and cerebral blood flow in both high acceleration conditions in a human centrifuge and in microgravity conditions in aeroplanes. In addition, he performed medical examinations of pilots and medical monitoring of human centrifuge training, and gave lessons to pilots on the physiological aspects of flying.

Since 1991, Kuipers has been involved in the preparation, coordination, baseline data collection and ground control of physiological experiments developed by the European Space Agency for space missions. In particular, he was a Project Scientist for Anthrorack, a human physiology facility that flew on the D-2 Spacelab mission in 1993, and for two payloads, for lung and bone physiology, that flew on board the Mir space station during the six-month Euromir 95 mission.

He was then involved in the development of the Torque Velocity Dynamometer (TVD) that flew on the LMS Spacelab mission in 1996, the Muscle Atrophy Research and Exercise System (MARES), a device used in muscle research on board the Space Station, and an electronic muscle stimulator (PEMS) to be used on astronauts.

In July 1999, Andre Kuipers joined the European Astronaut Corps of the European Space Agency, whose homebase is at the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) in Cologne, Germany.

RECENT ACTIVITIES: As well as participating in astronaut training, members of the European Astronaut Corps are assigned to projects involved in the assembly and on-board operations of the International Space Station.

Andre Kuipers was assigned to the European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC), Noordwijk, The Netherlands, continuing his former work for the Microgravity Payloads Division within the Directorate of Human Spaceflight.

Until the start of preparations for his flight, Andre supported an active research programme in the field of physiological adaptation to weightlessness in humans. He coordinated the European experiments on lung function and blood pressure regulation, using ESA's specially developed apparatus, the Advanced Respiratory Monitoring System (ARMS), which was launched with the Space Shuttle mission STS-107.

Since 1991 Andre Kuipers has continued to support the ESA parabolic flight campaigns, which are performed twice a year. He participated in these flights as an experiment operator, technician, test subject and flight surgeon.

CURRENT ASSIGNMENT: In 2002, Andre Kuipers completed ESA's Basic Training Programme, which is performed at EAC, Cologne, and Yuri A. Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre (Star City), near Moscow. Basic Training includes lessons in science and technology, as well as the systems on board the International Space Station, winter and water survival training and Extra Vehicular Activity (EVA), or 'spacewalk', training.

During the last two Soyuz missions with ESA astronauts to the International Space Station, Andre Kuipers supported ESA's ground team in the Russian Control Centre TsUP as "Crew Interface Coordinator". He was also backup of Pedro Duque for the Soyuz 7S mission, which took place in October 2003.

In December 2002, Andre Kuipers was assigned as a Flight Engineer for a Soyuz flight to the International Space Station (ISS) which is scheduled for launch on 19 April 2004.