Emanuel Schnitzer of LaRC suggested a possible adaptation for existing Apollo hardware to create a space laboratory, which he termed an 'Apollo X' vehicle. Schnitzer's concept involved using a standard Apollo command and service module in conjunction with an inflatable spheroid structure and transfer tunnel to create a space laboratory with artificial gravity potential.

He argued the technical feasibility of such a scheme with minimal weight penalties on the basic Apollo system. (Although little apparently was done with his idea, Schnitzer's thinking, along with similar thoughts by many of his colleagues, created a fertile environment within NASA for the idea of adapting Apollo-developed space hardware to laboratories and space stations in Earth orbit.) In April 1962 Paul Hill, Chief of the Applied Materials and Physics Division, stated that structures were under study which could hold from 4 to 30 people.