I'm curious why nobody has posted anything regarding Space Island Groups approach towards building a rather large space station using the shuttle's external tanks. Perhaps a few here can shed some light on the matter.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/08/world/americas/08rio.html I particularly enjoyed the photo of Pontes in a zero-G airplane flight, captioned "Col. Marcos Pontes in antigravity training." Way to go, NY Times 'space experts'.