The 15-day mission is focused on providing new sleeping quarters, a water purification system and better toilet facilities on the station, The New York Times reported.

"When the crew leaves, the station won't look any different on the outside, but it'll be dramatically different on the inside," Michael Suffredini, the NASA station program manager, said.

The crew's work includes moving equipment from the shuttle to the space station and installing it. The mission is to include four space walks, and one of the major tasks is to lubricate the 10-foot-diameter joints that keep the station's solar arrays pointed toward the sun.

The launch, under a full moon at 7:55 p.m. EST, took place on schedule without the weather and technical problems that sometimes plague the shuttle.

The shuttles are being phased out. Between 2010, when the last shuttle mission is scheduled, and 2015, when the new generation of U.S. space vehicles is set to begin flying, U.S. astronauts will be ferried to the station by Russian Soyuz spacecraft.