China will launch its Shenzhou 10 spacecraft next year on a manned mission to further improve its space docking technology achieved by the Shenzhou 9 mission earlier this year, an official said Saturday.

"Shenzhou 10 will carry three astronauts, possibly including a female astronaut," Yang Liwei, deputy director of the China Manned Space Engineering Office, was quoted by the Shanghai-based Labor Daily as saying Sunday.

"The selection of astronauts has not yet been completed. We are certain to choose astronauts for Shenzhou 10 from among those who have experience," Yang said at an exhibition of China's manned space program at Shanghai Jiao Tong University over the weekend.

Shenzhou 10 will aim to consolidate and optimize the difficult techniques used for automatic and manual docking of a space capsule with the Tiangong 1 space lab.

After the Shenzhou 10 mission, a second module for the Tiangong space station will be sent into orbit. China is expected to have completed the construction of its space station by 2020.

Apart from helping consolidate the docking technology, the new spacecraft will lay the groundwork for future construction of the country's space station.

The astronauts' workflow, mission schedule, work procedure and science experiments will also be intensely studied during the upcoming Shenzhou missions.

"Technological bottlenecks are waiting to be conquered including life support systems, how to accommodate humans living and working in the space station for a long period and how to offer support to the astronaut's physical and psychological conditioning," he said.

The former astronaut said China's space program is focusing on technological breakthroughs that still need tweaking and polishing.

滬江英語快訊：“神舟十號”飛船將于明年搭載三位航天員飛向太空。“神舟十號”飛船將于明年搭載三位航天員飛向太空。和“神九”一樣，仍將有三名航天員上天執(zhí)行任務，或仍將有女性航天員參與。目前“神十”航天員的人選尚未確定，但可以肯定的是，太空任務的執(zhí)行仍以老一批航天員為主。按照中國航天“三步走”戰(zhàn)略，2020年左右，我國就將建成自己的太空家園——空間站。