SinterHab Concept Calls for a Sustainable Moon Base Made from Baked

FYI,

"SinterHab Concept Calls for a Sustainable Moon Base Made from Baked Lunar Dust"
Gizmo Magazine
http://www.gizmag.com/sinterhab-sustainable-moon-base/26689

: The race to build a manned research station on the moon has been
: slowly picking up steam in recent years, with several developed
: nations actively studying a variety of construction methods. In
: just the past few months, the European Space Agency revealed a
: design involving 3D-printed structures and the Russian Federal
: Space Agency announced plans for a moon base by 2037. Now
: international design agency, Architecture Et Cetera (A-ETC), has
: thrown its hat into the ring with a proposal for SinterHab, a moon
: base consisting of bubble-like compartments coated in a protective
: layer of melted lunar dust.

: A design team of Tomas Rousek, Katarina Eriksson and Dr. Ondrej
: Doule collaborated with the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory on a
: possible lunar station located near the Shackleton crater of the
: moon's south pole.

: SinterHab is based around NASA's own concept of a mobile 3D printer
: that uses lunar dust (known as regolith) for material, called the
: Microwave Sinterator Freeform Additive Construction System
: (MS-FACS). Because of the unique properties of regolith
: particularly its small size and the presence of iron
: nanoparticles specific frequencies of microwave radiation can
: effectively heat the material well past its melting point and
: reform it into a ceramic-like substance. Researchers at Washington
: State University even tested this method on some man-made regolith
: provided by NASA with promising results.

: A proposal earlier this year by NASA described creating a
: solar-powered module that could process regolith in this manner and
: feed it to a robotic arm equipped with a microwave print head.
: Mounting all this equipment to an existing ATHLETE (All-Terrain
: Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer) would enable lunar soil to
: be harvested and repurposed into any shape at any location. For
: SinterHab, the baked soil would form a shield over the base to
: protect it from radiation and micrometeorites, as well as provide
: material for nearby roads and landing pads.

: The design shares some similarities with the ESA's moon base
: proposal, but differs in that it doesn't require the regolith to be
: combined with outside materials or shaped into a single dome.

: Instead, several inflatable membranes made of layered Kevlar, Mylar
: and other materials would be inflated and amassed together much
: like a cluster of bubbles. This way the sides of each dome could
: press together to form flat walls, and a base could be constructed
: using as many chambers as needed. According to A-ETC, a core of
: five domes could house four to eight people, including space for
: laboratories.

: In fact, the SinterHab designers claim there would be enough space
: inside the domes to cultivate gardens as part of a bio-regenerative
: life support system that would revitalize the air and water.
: Growing plants on the moon is an option that has been explored in
: the past, most recently during a successful experiment performed in
: China. The moon base's design calls for a low-maintenance
: agriculture system, with natural light supplied by a fiber optics
: system linked to several Fresnel collectors and plasma lamps.
: According to A-ETC, a series of gardens could also provide fresh
: food and improve the astronauts' morale.

: According to the designers, NASA has been using SinterHab as an
: example when trying to raise funding for its 3D printing
: technology, and development on "SinterHab 2.0" has already begun.
: We may still be decades away from seeing a functional moon base,
: but at least we can already start to see what a future lunar colony
: might look like.

Mark Reiff