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Space or Outer space is the empty regions of the universe outside the atmosphere of planets.

Outer space is not actually empty (i.e. a perfect vacuum) but contains a low density of particles, mostly hydrogen plasma, electromagnetic radiation, dark matter and dark energy.
Space is also filled with many forms of radiation that are dangerous to astronauts. Much of this infrared and ultraviolet radiation comes from the Sun. High energy X-rays, gamma rays and cosmic rays – particles travelling close to the speed of light – arrive from distant star systems.

There is no clear boundary between the Earth's atmosphere and space as the density of the atmosphere gradually decreases the further away you travel.
The United States consider people who travel above an altitude of 80km (50 miles) as astronauts.

In space, no one can hear you scream as sound waves cannot travel through a vacuum.

Space appears black as there is no air to scatter sunlight and produce a blue sky

Weightlessness in space is not the result of gravity itself being eliminated or even reduced significantly (in fact, gravity is only 3% less in orbital space than it is on earth) it is due to people or objects free-falling back to earth as space shuttles e.t.c follow the earths curvature, they travel horizontal at speeds of around 7.5 km per second (4.7 miles per second).

Space tourism has become so popular durign the past few years that even at $20million a ticket (£10m), the Russian Space Agency is fully booked until 2009!

On 12 April, 1961, the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin was the first person ever to travel into space as he blasted off into orbit in his Vostok 1 spacecraft.