NASA astronaut Kate Rubins will vote from space By Live Science, adapted by Newsela staff on 10.16.20 Word Count 487 Level 1040L Image 1. NASA Expedition 64 crew member astronaut Kate Rubins. Rubs plans to cast her next vote from space, more than 200 miles above Earth. Photo: Andrey Shelepin/GCTC/NASA via AP NASA astronaut Kate Rubins will vote in the upcoming presidential election, while in space. She will be floating in space 250 miles above Earth. Rubins will fly to the International Space Station on October 14, a few weeks before the U.S. presidential election on November 3. However, she will still be able to vote. Rubins has voted in space before, as have a number of other NASA astronauts. "I think it's really important for everybody to vote," Rubins said. "If we can do it from space, then I believe folks can do it from the ground, too." Absentee From Orbit During elections, people typically go to their local polling station and cast their ballot in person. Voting from space is like voting with an absentee ballot here on Earth. If a person is unable or This article is available at 5 reading levels at https://newsela.com. unwilling to vote in person, they can request that a ballot be sent by mail. Many people will also be voting by mail this election because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The main difference for Rubins is that she won't be sending her ballot through the mail. Instead, she will receive a secure electronic ballot. Then she will send it back to Mission Control, which will pass the ballot on to be counted. "It's critical to participate in our democracy," Rubins said. "We consider it an honor to be able to vote from space." Space Station Marks Two Decades In addition to being in space during the election, Rubins' stay aboard the space station will see another historic occasion. It will be the 20th anniversary of continuous human presence on the orbiting lab. She will also be in space to greet the crew of SpaceX's Crew-1. This mission is set to launch on October 23 from NASA's Kennedy Space Center and will be the first full-length flight of the vehicle. Rubins will launch with Russian astronauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov. They will be on a Russian spacecraft and lift off in the country Kazakhstan. Rubins Researches Genes, Atoms Rubins was the first person to sequence DNA in space. DNA is a long molecule found in every living thing, including humans, containing instructions for making the proteins that affect how our bodies grow and work. Traits are passed down from parent to offspring through DNA. DNA sequencing allows scientists to study the genetic code so they can compare healthy human genes to those that cause diseases. During her upcoming mission, Rubins will take part in a variety of research on the space station including a heart experiment and work with the Cold Atom Lab. The lab is an instrument on the space station that creates an extremely cold microgravity, or weightless, environment that astronauts use to study the behavior of atoms. This article is available at 5 reading levels at https://newsela.com..