basis of the Indian Human Spaceflight Programme. The spacecraft is being developed to carry up to three people, and a planned upgraded version will be equipped with a rendezvous and docking capability. In its first crewed mission, ISRO's largely autonomous spacecraft will orbit the Earth at altitude for up to seven days with a two-person crew on board. , the crewed mission is planned to be launched on ISRO's GSLV Mk III in 2023. Space station India plans to build a space station as a follow-up programme to Gaganyaan. ISRO chairman K. Sivan has said that India will not join the International Space Station programme and will instead build a space station on its own. It is expected to be placed in a low Earth orbit at altitude and be capable of harbouring three humans for 1520 days. The rough time-frame is five to seven years after completion of the Gaganyaan project. Planetary sciences and astronomy ISRO and Tata Institute of Fundamental Research have operated a balloon launch base at Hyderabad since 1967. Its proximity to the geo-magnetic equator, where both primary and secondary cosmic ray fluxes are low, makes it an ideal location to study diffuse cosmic X-ray background. ISRO played a role in the discovery of three species of bacteria in the upper stratosphere at an altitude between . The bacteria, highly resistant to ultra-violet radiation, are not found elsewhere on Earth, leading to speculation on whether they are extraterrestrial in origin. They are considered extremophiles, and named as Bacillus isronensis in recognition of ISRO's contribution in the balloon experiments, which led to its discovery, Bacillus aryabhata after India's celebrated ancient astronomer Aryabhata and Janibacter hoylei after the distinguished astrophysicist Fred Hoyle. Astrosat Launched in 2015, Astrosat is India's first dedicated multi-wavelength space observatory. Its observation study includes active galactic nuclei, hot white dwarfs, pulsations of pulsars, binary star systems, and supermassive black holes located at the centre of the galaxy. Extraterrestrial exploration Lunar exploration Chandryaan () are India's series of lunar exploration spacecraft. The initial mission included an orbiter and controlled impact probe while later missions include landers, rovers and sampling missions. Chandrayaan-1 Chandrayaan-1 was India's first mission to the Moon. The robotic lunar exploration mission included a lunar orbiter and an impactor called the Moon Impact Probe. ISRO launched it using a modified version of the PSLV on 22 October 2008 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre.