[1] The spacecraft, the first of a series of spacecraft used to investigate the means for crewed space flight, contained scientific instruments, a television system, and a self-sustaining biological cabin with a dummy of a man.

It was designed to study the operation of the life support system and the stresses of flight.

[4] A 20-pound piece of the descent module landed in Manitowoc, Wisconsin in the northern United States.

[5][6] Giovanni Battista Judica Cordiglia, who set up his own amateur listening station at Torre Bert near Turin, is reported to have claimed that radio signals were received on November 28, 1960, which could have originated from this spacecraft; the spacecraft is known to have radioed prerecorded voice communications.

It has led some to believe a conspiracy theory that the spacecraft may have been crewed by one of the Lost Cosmonauts.