BEIJING, April 28 (Xinhua) -- The following are the highlights of China's key technology news from the past week:
REUSABLE ROCKET
Xiamen University launched and recovered its first rocket in northwest China's desert.
The reusable rocket, the Jiageng-I rocket, has a total length of 8.7 meters, a wingspan of 2.5 meters and a take-off mass of 3,700 kg. It traveled at a maximum altitude of 26.2 km and was recovered at the designated landing site.
SPACE EXPERIMENTS
Science facilities on China's planned Tiangong space station could support hundreds of space research projects after it's completed in 2022.
Sixteen experiment racks will be installed in the core module and two lab capsules of the space station, and an extravehicular experiment platform will be built.
LONG MARCH-5B ROCKET
China's Long March-5B carrier rocket is scheduled to make its maiden flight in the first half of 2020. With the largest carrying capacity to low-Earth orbit, it will carry the core capsule and experiment capsules of China's space station.
BEIDOU SATELLITE
A newly-launched satellite of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) entered its preset orbit.
After in-orbit tests, the satellite will work with 18 other BDS-3 satellites in intermediate circular orbit and one in geosynchronous Earth orbit.
NEW AIRPORT'S AIR CONDITIONING SYSTEM
Beijing Daxing International Airport will be equipped with a ground-source heat pump system, a type of highly efficient, energy saving air conditioning system that provides indoor heating and cooling by using shallow geothermal resources.
The new airport is expected to handle 45 million passengers annually by 2021 and 72 million by 2025.
