Space Adventures announced today that Daisuke “Dice-K” Enomoto has been officially confirmed as a member of the Soyuz TMA-9 crew that will fly to the ISS in September, alongside Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin and NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria. Enomoto had, of course, been in training for this flight for months. Anousheh Ansari was also named to the backup crew should Enomoto not be able to fly for some reason; it’s assumed that eventually she, too, will fly to the ISS, although it’s not clear when.

The launch of the first subscale prototype of Bigelow Aerospace’s inflatable habitats is being delayed by about a month. The company announced Tuesday that the launch, which had been scheduled for June 16 (and is still listed as such on the official Roskosmos launch schedule) will be delayed to July 4-14. “This delay is necessary due to special preparations that the launch provider is continuing to make for our flight,” the company reported on its web site. (Also see an MSNBC.com article.) The company said it is still taking reservations for carrying photos and memorabilia on the Genesis 2 launch, planned for later this year; if the July launch goes well the company will contact people who made reservations to complete their transactions.