The US space shuttle Discovery was poised to reach the International Space Station yesterday as part of its final mission, carrying a new module and a robot to the orbiting research lab.

The shuttle, which blasted off from the Kennedy Space Centre last Thursday, was set to dock with the ISS at 8.15 p.m. Discovery’s 11-day tour of duty in low Earth orbit is to include two spacewalks.

Late on Friday, Nasa said the astronauts had inspected the orbiter’s thermal protection system and had checked out spacesuits and rendezvous tools in preparation for yesterday’s docking.

The Discovery crew plans to deliver the Permanent Multipurpose Module, with extra storage space and an area for experiments, as well as some spare parts and the Express Logistic Carrier, an external platform for large equipment.

The shuttle will also bring the first humanoid robot to the ISS. The Robonaut 2, or R2, is a joint project of General Motors and Nasa and will stay behind as a permanent resident of the space station when the shuttle leaves.

The Discovery crew awoke to music at 12.53 p.m., Nasa said yesterday.

The space craft “will arrive at a point about 183 metres directly below the station about an hour before docking,” Nasa said, and Commander Steve Lindsey “will execute the rendezvous pitch maneuver, a one-degree-per-second rotational ‘backflip.’”