Featured Image Credit: X/@ISS_Research
Topics: NASA, Science, Space, Technology, Twitter, International Space Station
Callum Jones
Topics: NASA, Science, Space, Technology, Twitter, International Space Station
While there are a lot of questions astronauts may be asking themselves in space, there is one that's very important.
'How am I going to be able to drink my coffee without spilling it?' with zero gravity, of course, this can be rather difficult.
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Thankfully, NASA astronaut Donald Pettit is on hand with the Capillary Cup, a zero-gravity cup designed to be used in a microgravity environment.
Pettit produced the cup to fulfil his desire to drink water without a bag and straw in outer space, while he was on the International Space Station in 2008.
The cup received the first ever patent for an object invented in space, while it also featured in the May 2009 issue of National Geographic magazine, along with Pettit's notes on making the creation.
“We take gravity for granted,” Pettit said at the time.
"Generally, we are unaware of the weight of our hands, or how easily we pour coffee into a cup. We don’t stop to think, ‘Will the coffee rise up and pour out?’ or ‘Can we pour the coffee?’ We just do it. Gravity handles this for us by applying force to the coffee, pulling downward.”
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A video of Pettit showing off the cup on the International Space Station has recently resurfaced thanks to a post by Historic Vids on X, formerly known as Twitter.
"This unique coffee cup was designed to never spill in space," the account captioned video.
If you head to the comments section, you'll notice that everyone is pointing out exactly what it looks like.
"Drinking coffee out of a floating vagina?" one person asked.
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"I’m glad NASA spent millions of taxpayer money to design a cup that looks like a vagina," a second added.
"Engineers come up with the best solutions. I wonder where they found inspiration," a third joked.
While the comparisons are a little unfortunate for Pettit, he will certainly be proud of his creation.
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He always keeps his eyes open for new opportunities and experimentation, with this special coffee cup certainly a prime example of that.
"Consider what will happen when the pull of gravity goes away from the cup of coffee," he previously said.
“From what we know about earthbound coffee drinking, there will be no gravity to pull the coffee downward as we tilt the cup.
"We tilt the cup, and the coffee stays level. As the cup tilts, the edge of the mug reaches the edge of the coffee and liquid simply pours out. It’s that simple.”