Perhaps one of the last barriers to the human conquest of space has been removed; a space-rated espresso machine has now been delivered to the International Space Station (ISS).

The device was made by two Turin-based companies, Lavazza Coffee and engineering firm Argotec. It is called the ISSpresso and was delivered by Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti in the early hours of Monday morning, when her Soyuz space capsule docked at the orbiting habitat.

Making coffee in space is difficult, especially espresso, which relies on 94°C water being passed through ground coffee under high pressure.

On Earth this is achieved with the help of gravity. The ground coffee is placed in a perforated container, the water is heated and shot on to the coffee to drip into the cup. In space there is no up and down, so things don’t naturally fall.

Water – and the scalding coffee – would simply form droplets and float away, presenting a hazard both to the astronauts and to the sensitive electronics on board. So the ISSpresso takes water from a pouch and pumps it round the machine.

The water is heated and placed under pressure then fired through a capsule of ground coffee. According to the Italian national espresso institute, the water must reach the coffee at 9 bar of pressure to be called a certified Italian espresso.

To guard against accidents, the piping in the ISSpresso can withstand pressures of up to 400 bar. The machine itself weighs 20kg, which is the same as all the science instruments on the Philae comet lander put together.

The resulting drink is pumped into another plastic pouch and the astronaut drinks it through a straw.

Not the pinnacle of chic usually associated with an espresso cup but Giuseppe Lavazza, vice-president of the coffee company, says that the taste itself will be indistinguishable from that bought in Earth-bound coffee shops.

Argotec have been working on the design since 2012, when a previous Italian astronaut, Luca Parmitano, complained after only a week in orbit that the only thing he missed was a good Italian espresso.

Those hoping for cappuccino on the ISS however still have some time to wait. The process relies on frothing milk using steam, then separating the resulting foam from the milk. On Earth, gravity does the separation for you. In zero-G, the milk and the foam would be almost inseparable unless you placed the device in a centrifuge. But then, how do you get the milk foam to float on the coffee?

Nasa has designed its own version of an espresso machine but instead of making coffee it is going to look for life on Mars. The Mars Organic Analyser would grind samples of Martian rock and then pass hot, high pressure water over them to extract organic molecules.

The resulting liquid would taste about as good as the earlier ISS coffee but could be analysed to betray the existence of past or present life on the Red Planet.