Semi-circular rows of computers, electronic switchboards and unobtrusive decor make the Operations Control Center (OCC) for NASA's Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF) look like a scaled-down version of the mission control rooms in movies.

This control room is real, however, and located at 1 Hampshire Street, near Kendall Square.

From here, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory will monitor the AXAF telescope after the Space Shuttle Columbia launches it Jan. 26, 1999.

Five of Columbia's crew members visited the facility yesterday and answered questions from an audience which included both OCC staff members and enthusiastic children.

AXAF is the third of NASA's major observatories, along with the Hubble Space Telescope and the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory.

It will travel on a highly elliptical orbit for five to seven years. AXAF will observe the universe in fifty times more detail than any previous X-ray telescope. The satellite combines the ability to make sharp images while measuring precisely the energies of X-rays coming from cosmic sources.

AXAF will study many phenomena, including supernovae, black holes and nebulae.

The crew will be lead by Eileen M. Collins, the first U.S. woman to command a shuttle mission.

The astronauts, dressed in blue jump-suits covered with patches, answered questions about the mission ahead and daily life in outer space.

Mission Specialist Steven A. Hawley explained how the deployment of AFAX will differ from that of the Hubble telescope.

He said Hubble was deployed by a robot arm and stayed in a low orbit, whereas AFAX will use booster rockets to leave earth's orbit for its higher, elliptical orbit.

Collins noted that, unlike Hubble, AFAX cannot be serviced once deployed.

"We can't retrieve AXAF once we let it go," Collins said.

AFAX is also exceptional because it weighs a whopping 248 thousand lbs.

"AFAX is the heaviest weight ever flown on the Space Shuttle," Collins said.