André Kuipers

André Kuipers is a Dutch physician and astronaut of the European Space Agency, born in Amsterdam on 5 October 1958. He graduated from high school in Amsterdam in 1977 and received his medical degree from the University of Amsterdam in 1987. He wanted to become an astronaut from his teenage years and was selected for the European Astronaut Corps in 1998. His first spaceflight was the short DELTA mission to the International Space Station in April 2004, during which he carried out twenty-one experiments including physiology, biology, microbiology and medicine work and a plant growth study run with Dutch primary school children. He flew again from December 2011 to July 2012 on the PromISSe mission, which formed part of Expeditions 30 and 31. His honours include the Order of Orange-Nassau, the Order of the Netherlands Lion and an honorary doctorate from the University of Amsterdam. The source article does not name a medical specialty for him.