CLEVELAND — NASA’s Glenn Research Center will host an International Space Station Research Forum June 17 from 8:30 a.m. to noon in the Glenn Visitor Center at the Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland. This event is part of NASA’s “Destination: Station,” which will showcase the space station as a National Laboratory and offer NASA support to interested researchers.

The goal of the forum is to promote opportunities for research and technology development and feature accomplishments and opportunities for future research aboard the space station among commercial, academic, government and other institutions. The forum is free. Registration is required. Go to http://www.oai.org/DestinationStation to register.

To make arrangements to cover the day’s activities, contact Sally Harrington at 216-433-2037.

Highlights of the forum:

Astronaut Don Pettit will discuss conducting research in microgravity. Pettit lived aboard the space station for 5 1/2 months in 2002-2003, and he is scheduled to return to station later this year as flight engineer for space station Expedition 30. Pettit will be available to reporters between 9:30-10 a.m.

Dr. Julie Robinson, space station program scientist at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, will give an overview of the program. Program researchers currently making use of the unique orbiting National Laboratory will discuss science disciplines and specific space station success stories during panel discussions.

During the afternoon, there will be tours of Glenn’s premier facilities that support space station research. The Ohio Aerospace Institute and Team Northeast Ohio, among other local organizations, assisted Glenn in arranging this forum. Additional “Destination: Station” events will take place in Ohio. A new “Destination: Station” exhibit will be open to the public at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton for two months starting on the museum’s family day, June 18, through July 27. Other events will occur in Columbus June 19 -24.

For further information about these events, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/news/pressrel/2011/11-036_station.html