Cape Canaveral: A South Korean scientist and amateur boxer soon to become his country's first astronaut said he would bring soil from each side of the divided Korean peninsula and mix them together in space during his flight.

"We still think this is one country," Ko San told reporters on a televised news conference yesterday.

"So I am going to bring the soil of North and South (Korea). I am going to mix them up in space," he added.

Ko, 31, will launch in April aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket along with cosmonauts Sergei Volkov, who will be replacing NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson as commander of the International Space Station, and flight engineer Oleg Kononenko.

Ko returns to Earth with Whitson and flight engineer Yuri Malenchenko after spending ten days in space conducting experiments.

"Our government has long-term plans for the space programme," Ko said. We don't know if we can send another astronaut or not, but we will continue our experiments. We have plans for moon exploration. I and (backup Yi So-yeon) are going to work in that field after this, he said.

Ko was selected from among 36,000 applicants to represent his country on a mission estimated to cost about 28 million dollars. After studying mathematics and cognitive science at Seoul National University, Ko was working at the Korea Aerospace Research Institute on computer vision systems when he saw an advertisement for the astronaut's job.

Source : UNI