Author: admin

     Water is the lifeblood of human survival and civilization on Earth. It is also critical for our sustained exploration beyond Earth. Mars has plenty of water to sustain our exploration and colonization in the form of subsurface ice. However, it is not clean water. It is contaminated by toxic perchlorates which are a serious environmental hazard on Earth. Perchlorate and chlorate are potent oxidizers that cause equipment corrosion. They are also hazardous to human health even at low concentrations.
     It is critical that Martian water be detoxified to remove these contaminating solutes before it can be used in propellant production, food production, or human consumption in a Martian colony. The scale of anticipated water demand on Mars highlights the shortcomings of traditional water purification approaches. These require large amounts of consumable materials, high electrical draw, or water pretreatment.
     Is there any efficient and cheap way to remove the perchlorates? This innovative solution has been proposed for a NASA NAIC 2024 Phase 1 project. It takes advantage of the reduction of chlorate and perchlorate to chloride and oxygen being thermodynamically favorable, if kinetically slow. This is the promise of the proposed regenerative perchlorate reduction system. It applies synthetic biology to take advantage of and improve upon natural perchlorate reducing bacteria. These terrestrial microbes are not directly suitable for use is space and other celestial bodies. Their key genes pcrAB and cld, which catalyze the reduction of perchlorates to chloride and oxygen, have been previously identified and well-studied.
     This proposed work is based on the prior work studying perchlorate-reducing bacteria by engineering this perchlorate reduction pathway into the spaceflight proven Bacillus subtilis strain 168, under the control of a robust, active promoter. This solution is both highly sustainable and scalable. Unlike traditional water purification approaches, it outright eliminates perchlorates rather than filtering them to dump somewhere.
     Phase I will explore whether this approach is feasible through these objectives:
1. The genes PcrAB and cld will be engineered into B. subtilis 168 under the control of the strong promoter pVeg then tested to quantify the efficacy of perchlorate reduction under the modeled conditions.
2. Bacillus subtilis strains will be developed that secrete the enzymes to test intracellular vs extracellular efficacy.
3. A trade study will be performed to compare the performance of biological water detoxification from Objectives 1 & 2 to traditional engineering approaches in terms of mass, power, and crew time.
4. A plan will be developed to include this technology in human Mars missions. Development of detoxification biotechnology will also lead to more efficient solutions to natural and particularly industrial terrestrial perchlorate contamination on Earth. It will also reveal the potential of using life rather than only industrial solutions to address our environmental problems. This may stimulate further innovations for other terrestrial environmental challenges such as climate change.
5. The biological decontamination system will be launched as inert, dried spores stable at room temperature for years. Upon arrival at Mars, the spores will be rehydrated and grown in a bioreactor that satisfies planetary protection standards. Martian water will be processed by the bioreactor to carry out perchlorate reduction. The processed water will then be used or further purified as required.

     NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts program seeks innovations from diverse and non-traditional sources. NIAC projects study innovative, technically credible, advanced concepts that could one day “change the possible” in aerospace. Here is a NAIC program from 2024.
    New space missions, such as a rendezvous with a passing interstellar object, or a multi-target observing effort at the solar gravitational focus, require velocities that are well beyond conventional rocketry. Exotic solar sail approaches might allow reaching the required distant localities, but are they unable to then make the required propulsive maneuvers in deep space. Nuclear powered rockets are big and expensive systems with marginal capability to reach the location. We propose a Thin Film Isotope Nuclear Engine Rocket with sufficient capability to search, rendezvous and then return samples from distant and rapidly moving interstellar objects. The same technology would allow a gravitational lens telescope to be repointed so a single mission could observe numerous high-value targets.
     The basic concept of TFINER is to manufacture thin sheets of a radioactive isotope and use the momentum of its decay products to generate thrust. The basic design is a approximately ten-micron thick Thorium-228 radioisotope film which undergoes alpha decay with a half-life of about two years. The decay chain cascade produces daughter products with four additional alpha emissions that have half-lives between three hundred nanoseconds and three days. Thrust is produced when one side of the thin film is coated with an approximately fifty-micron thick absorber that captures forward emissions. Multiple “stages” consisting of longer half-life isotopes such as actinium-227 can be combined to maximize the velocity for extended mission timelines.
Key differences of the concepts are:
• Cascading isotope decay chains of the Thorium cycle increases performance by about five hundred percent.
• Multiple ‘stages’ sheets of radioactive materials increase delta-V and lifetime without reducing thrust
• Thrust sheet reconfiguration enables active thrust vectoring and spacecraft maneuvers
• Substrate thermo-electrics can generate additional electrical power such as fifty kilowatts at an efficiency of one percent
• A substrate beta emitter can be used for charge neutralization or to induce a voltage bias that directs exhaust emissions and/or to exploit the outbound solar wind
     Leveraging sixty-six pounds of radioisotope spread over three hundred square yards of area would provide more than one hundred and fifty kilometers per second of delta-V to a sixty-six pound payload. Multiple systems could be inserted into a solar escape trajectory with a single conventional launch vehicle allowing local search and rendezvous operations in the outer solar system. The TFINER system is scalable to other payloads and missions. Key advantages are:
• Ability to reach a velocity greater than sixty-two km/sec with spare capacity for rendezvous operations with objects outside the solar system including options for sample return.
• Simple design based on known physics and well-known materials
• Scalable to smaller payloads such as sensors or to larger missions such as telescopes
• Ability to reach deep space more than one hundred and fifty astronomical unites very quickly and then continue aggressive maneuvers greater than sixty-two miles per second for dim object search/rendezvous and/or retargeting telescopes at the solar gravitational focus over a period of years.

     Rocket propulsion technology has progressed far beyond the first weaponized rockets of the Chinese and Mongolian empires. They were really nothing more than rocket-powered arrows and spears but they set the foundations for our exploration of space. Liquid propellant, ion engines and solar sails have all been featured in the media as we strive for more efficient methods of space travel. However, a team of researchers has taken the next leap with a palm-sized thruster system that could boost future tiny spacecraft across the gulf of space.
     Palm-sized thrusters are quite different from the huge rockets we are used to. An example would be the Saturn V rocket that carried the Apollo astronauts to the moon. That rocket stood three hundred and sixty feet tall. The new ion thrusters are designed for maneuvering and propelling cubesats and small satellites once they are in space rather than propelling rockets from the surface of the Earth.
     The research team is led by Daniel Perez Grande who is the CEO and Co-Founder of IENAI Spain. They have called their palm-sized thruster “ATHENA,” which stands for the Adaptable, THruster based on Electrospray powered NAnotechnology. The technology has been developed for the European Space Agency. Next will be a design stage and, if all goes to plan, a prototype will be available by the end of 2024.
     The ATHENA technology relies upon something known as an electrospray which has previously been used in mass spectrometry but has now found its way into spacecraft propulsion. Each thruster has seven emitter arrays that are etched onto silicon wafers. Each array houses 500 pinhole emitters. Electrically charged particles from a conductive salt are sprayed out of the arrays. They are propelled via an electrostatic field to produce the maximum amount of thrust, which can be of the order of about twelve miles per second. This concept is very similar to the ion propulsion systems already in use but the new engine is a much smaller scale.
      Like its ion and liquid propellant precursors, the thruster is highly adjustable and can be reconfigured in flight. The thrusters are also eco-friendly because the propellant is a non-toxic liquid and requires no pressurized storage tanks. The small size of the thrusters allows them to be grouped together in any required configuration with a total of six required to fit the face of a typical four inch cubesat and can be clustered together on satellites and probes of up to one-hundred-and-ten-pound mass. The researchers are hoping they can develop the technology further to work on craft up to six hundred and sixty pounds.
     Like most other areas of technology, space technology is getting smaller and smaller. In order to achieve this though, the propulsion systems also have to shrink, and this is potentially a more challenging task. ATEHNA appears to be a promising development, but ESA and their partners are working on two other thruster systems based upon electrospray technology. All of these seem to be bringing promising results.

     The chief of the U.S. Space Force has reviewed how Washington may respond if Moscow shoot down Western commercial satellites.
     General Chance Saltzman said at a press conference in Hawaii on September 20 that U.S. civilian and military satellites and space capabilities are under threat from nations like China and Russia. He outlined how Washington could respond should Moscow attack SpaceX’s Starlink broadband network. Ukraine has been using Starlink for Internet connectivity in Russia’s full-scale invasion.
Saltzman was responding to questions from reporters about threats made by Russia in October 2022 that the country could destroy Western commercial satellites should they be used to assist Ukraine in the war.
     Konstantin Vorontsov is the deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Department. He said last October that the use of military purposes” by the West constitutes an “extremely dangerous trend.”
     Vladimir Ermakov is the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control. On Monday, he echoed Vorontsov’s remarks when he said quasi-civilian Western satellites could be a legitimate target for a retaliatory strike.
     Saltzman indicated that the U.S. would defend its commercial satellites should they come under attack.
Saltzman added that in a modern war, “there are going to be commercial entities, commercial organizations, commercial capabilities and assets that get caught up in the conflicts. Space is no different than sea lanes. It’s no different than civilian airliner traffic in Europe right now. The U.S. has a long history of saying we’re going to protect the things that we need to be successful. So it would stand to reason that that same philosophy would extend into space, and I have no reason to believe that that will be different.”
     Neither Russian official indicated which companies have assisted Ukraine in the war via satellite technology. However, in the early days of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Elon Musk’s SpaceX deployed its Starlink satellites to help provide Kyiv with internet service. Musk has stated that SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet system provides Ukraine with a “major battlefield advantage.”
     The company has so far privately funded a network of nearly 4,000 satellites which are to be launched into low-Earth orbit. Ukrainian troops have used Starlink for battlefield communications in the war with Russia.
     Gwynne Shotwell is SpaceX’s president and chief operating officer, In February, she said the company was preventing Kyiv from using the network to control drones in the region, saying the service was “never meant to be weaponized.”
     Musk has also refused to allow Ukraine to use Starlink internet services to launch an attack on Crimea to avoid complicity in a “major act of war.” which was annexed by Russia in 2014.
     Musk wrote in early September that “There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol. The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet at anchor. If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.”
     John Kirby is the White House National Security Council spokesperson. He said in October 2022 that the U.S. would “continue to pursue all means to expose, deter and hold Russia accountable for any such attack should that occur.”

Part 1 of 4 Parts
     There has been a lot of media recently dedicated to colonizing Mars. Some critics of these plans say that it would make more sense to colonize the Moon first. The only way to prepare a world for human habitation is to make the environment more Earth-like which is referred to as “terraforming’. Some scientists in space industries believe that the Moon would be a better choice. It is close to Earth and has many factors that make it very appealing.
      No matter how advanced our civilization on Earth becomes, we will still have to deal with the fact that Earth’s resources are finite. We usually think in terms of resources such as minerals, clear water, and breathable air. However, there is something that is even more fundamental and restrictive which is land area. No matter how thoroughly we develop, there is only a finite amount of inhabitable continental land area on Earth.
     Although there may ultimately be floating cities on the seas and ocean, the finite land surface area of Earth ensures that we will have to leave our home planet if want our civilization to continue to expand. Many people have dreamed of living on another world. However, we have yet to find even a hint  of life on any world beyond Earth. If we want a world suitable for use to live on, our only option will be to transform a presently uninhabitable planet into one that humans can survive on. We will have to terraform our new home. In spite of the popular sentiment that Mars is the best world to terraform, the Moon may be an even better option closer to home.
      At first glance, it may appear that Mars is a much better choice for terraforming than the Moon. Mars already has large quantities of water on its surface. In the distant past, Mars had extensive liquid water on its surface. Mars is much larger than the Moon and it has a higher gravitational acceleration than the Moon does. Its atmosphere is thin but it is rich in carbon dioxide.
      However, Mars also faces serious issues that the Moon does not. Mars is further from the Sun which means that it receives less energy from the Sun on every square meter of area. Mars’ atmosphere is a huge hazard with high winds, frequent sandstorms, and shifting dunes. Mars has no protective magnetic fields like Earth does. This means that it is bombarded by particles in the solar wind. If anyone living on the surface of Mars did not want to be given a lethal dose of radiation on timescales much less than a human lifetime, humans on Mars would have to move underground. The existence of huge lava tubes on Mars does make this a possibility.
     None of these Martian issues is insurmountable. With a big enough investment of resources, almost anything is possible. However, the more resources that you have to bring with you to Mars in order to survive and thrive and to protect you from the harmful effects of all threats, the more difficult this will be.
Please read Part 2 next

Part 2 of 2 Parts
     Another critical need for astronauts on the lunar surface is access to drinkable water. This will require new water reclamation techniques. Water makes up about sixty percent of the human body. It is critical for health, sanitation, and irrigation. In order to provide enough water for long-duration missions, systems will need to be able to recover about ninety eight percent of the water used by the crew. On the ISS, researchers are working toward this goal. One system being tested is the ECLSS: Brine Processor System which demonstrates a technology to recover additional water from crew urine and reduce wastewater. This system uses special membranes in the system to retain contaminates and pass water vapor into the cabin’s atmosphere. Then the water vapor is captured and delivered to a water processing system. The system can also provide clean air and support the development of technologies that will be needed for future missions. This system has potential applications on Earth in remote locations with limited access to water as well.
     A major challenge for lunar exploration will be infrastructure and materials needed to work and live in space. Two technologies that will help with this challenge are 3D printing and improved cement. Astronauts exploring near and deep space will need spare parts, tools, and materials available on demand. Continuous cargo resupply will be rendered impractical as missions travel farther from Earth. Creative solutions such as 3D printing could be the answer. 3D printing in Zero-G has produced dozens of parts for the ISS. This has proven that additive manufacturing and 3D printers work in microgravity. These experiments could be the first step toward establishing a machine shop for long-duration missions and even offer a way to recycle plastic materials. Improving 3D printing technology could also be a benefit to industries on Earth as well.
     Habitats and infrastructure are other critical components of living and working in space. Microgravity Investigation of Cement Solidification studies the complex process of hardening cement. Without gravity, the microstructure of solidified cements is very different from concrete that has been hardened on Earth. These studies evaluate the microstructure and material properties of cement. They also test responses to different thermal and mechanical loading. This could lead to ways to use this material to build lightweight space structures. Experimental results could also improve the properties of cement used on Earth and lower the carbon dioxide emissions generated by its production.
     Another significant challenge for space travel is the limited availability of medical treatment for injuries. Custom wound patching may be one of the solutions to this challenge. In space, there will be no hospitals or ambulances to call in an emergency. Research on the ISS is preparing crews for missions without the need for immediate medical support by testing innovative technology such as Bioprint FirstAid. This European Space Agency experiment demonstrates a device that could 3D print a custom wound patch on demand using a bioink made from cells obtained from the patient’s cells. This method could accelerate the healing process. On the surface of the Earth, such custom wound patches could provide patients with personalized and portable treatment options.
     The challenges and possible solutions listed above are just some of the important issues in space exploration and exploitation that will need to be addressed as humans embark on missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. As the Artemis missions works to establish a long-term presence on the Moon and the ISS continues its decades of studies and results, missions taking humans farther from the Earth are coming soon.

Part 1 of 2 Parts
     Project Artemis is NASA’s new lunar exploration program. It includes sending the first woman and first person of color to the Moon. Through the Artemis missions, NASA will use new technology to study the Moon in new and better ways. It will also be preparing the way for human missions to Mars.
     The primary launch vehicle for Artemis is the Space Launch System which is the most powerful rocket ever built in the world. The SLS will carry the Orion spacecraft with up to four astronauts to lunar orbit. Once in lunar orbit, the spacecraft will dock with a small spaceship called the Gateway. Astronauts will use the Gateway to prepare for missions to the Moon and beyond. The crew will descend to the lunar surface in a new human landing system. Following a mission to the lunar surface, the crew will return to the Gateway. When the missions are finished, the astronauts will use the Orion spacecraft to return to Earth.
     Before Artemis carries a human crew to the Moon, NASA will test the rocket and spacecraft in flight and then send a crew for a test flight.
     Getting a spacecraft to the Moon or Mars is rocket science. Other areas of science are needed to sustain life on the lunar surface and enable activities during trips to the Moon. Experiments aboard the International Space Station will serve as the basis for much of that science. They will help lay a foundation for the Artemis missions.
     On November 16, NASA launched the Orion spacecraft atop the SLS for the Artemis 1 flight test. This uncrewed flight will help NASA understand the performance of the rocket and spacecraft in the deep space environment. These missions will return astronauts to the lunar surface, develop the infrastructure needed to establish a long-term presence on the Moon. They will also act as a steppingstone for sending astronauts to Mars.
     Artemis astronauts will need to live and work in deep space and traverse the lunar surface for expeditions of up to weeks in duration. Ongoing scientific investigations and technology demonstrations on the ISS can assist in the creation of solutions to many of the challenges associated with missions to the Moon and Mars.
     Here are explanations of how some of the work on the orbiting labs in the ISS could help address challenges ahead as humans journey back to the Moon, on to Mars, and beyond.
      A big challenge for astronauts on the lunar surface is obtaining the food required to survive. The solution will involve hydroponic and aeroponic food growth. Humans need food and water to survive, but during longer missions, the quality and nutritional value of packaged food can decline. An ample amount of food is critical to sustain and supplement the astronauts during missions to the Moon and across the solar system. The ISS’s eXposed Root On-Orbit Test System experiments uses aeroponic and hydroponic systems to grow fresh food without the need for tradition growth media. Results could lead to large-scale food production systems. The weight requirements for these systems and fresh food would be lowered. This would allow more room for other valuable cargo carried by launch vehicles. Currently the ISS offers the only facility for studying plant growth in microgravity. Ultimately, technologies will be developed for maximizing crop production. Here on the ground, XROOTS could contribute to improved food security and enhanced crop cultivation.
Please read Part 2 next

     In-space manufacturing will form a huge part of the future of space exploitation. It will massively reduce the cost of launching otherwise fully built structures to orbit and beyond.
    ThinkOrbital is a private space sector startup. On its website, the mission statement says “To accelerate the accessibility and commercialization of cislunar space through cost-effective, pressurizable, scalable and multi-purpose infrastructure.”
   ThinkOrbital is working on an orbital platform that could eventually be used to manufacture products in space. It also wants to find solutions to the growing space debris problem.
     One of ThinkOrbital’s cofounders claims that it could be compatible with SpaceX’s fully reusable Starship rocket which could eventually take humans to Mars.
     ThinkOrbital submitted its design as a proposal for a NASA bid for new space station concepts last year. It lost in the bidding for that project. NASA awarded four hundred and sixteen million dollars to  Blue Origin, Nanoracks, and Northrop Grumman. ThinkOrbital was not discouraged when it lost the NASA contract bidding contest. It has refined its concept since it lost.
     The startup’s platform is called ThinkPlatform. It is envisioned as a non-pressurized, free-flying module that could dock with a space station or spacecraft, such as SpaceX’s Starship. Even thought it lost in the bid for a lucrative NASA contract, ThinkOrbital did recently secure two research contracts worth two hundred and sixty thousand dollars under the U.S. Space Force Orbital Prime’s program for in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing.
     Lee Rosen is cofounder and president of ThinkOrbital. He said, “This platform can be for manufacturing, human habitation, military applications, and whatnot. And the good news is we don’t have to bend any physics to make it happen. In-space electron beam welding was demonstrated by the Soviets in the 80s, so we know it works.”
     The ThinkPlatform would be assembled in space using robotic arm technology. Rosen pointed out that this technology already exists. However, it would need to be upgraded so it could autonomously build the platform in space. He added that “We want to do an inflight demo so we have the data ourselves. But we’re confident that it works.”
     If the ThinkOrbial’s ThinkPlatform is ever launched into orbit, it could be used to manufacture high-speed computer chips, pharmaceutical products, and fiber optics for the public and private sectors. The platform could also deploy small satellites to collect space junk. The collected space junk would either be recycled with solar panels and aluminum to make fuel being recovered. Or the debris could be deorbited so that it burns up in the atmosphere. Rosen said, “We could process debris at that hub, for example, and turn aluminum into an aluminum powder that could be used for spacecraft fuel.
     The International Space Station is set to deorbit around 2030. NASA is looking to the private space sector to build the next generation of orbital stations. Though ThinkOrbital has not yet managed to obtain a NASA contract, it forms an important part of the private space sector that is constantly innovating and bring new solutions to orbit.

Part 3 of 3 Parts
     Talking about the next phase, Pelligrino said, “Most spacecraft today have solar arrays—photovoltaic cells bonded to a carrier structure—but not with this type of material and not folded to the dimensions we’ve achieved. By using novel folding techniques, inspired by origami, we are able to significantly reduce the dimensions of a giant spacecraft for launch. The packaging is so tight as to be essentially free of any voids.”
     Hajimiri added that, “Wireless power transfer of this nature has not been demonstrated in space. We are also demonstrating it with our flexible, lightweight material, not necessarily a rigid structure. That adds complexity.”
     Considering the impact of widespread beamed solar power on society, Hajimiri said, “It is going to revolutionize the nature of energy and access to it so that it becomes ubiquitous, it becomes dispatchable energy. You can send it where you need it. This redirection of energy is done without any mechanical movements, purely through electrical means using a focusing array, which makes it extremely fast.”
       Atwater responded, “I think one can say that the Brens’ vision really was to do something that, as Ali mentioned, originally emerged almost from science fiction, to do something that would become a large-scale energy source for the world.”
      Pelligrino added, “We have had JPL collaborators join our team, and that collaboration has become powerful and useful to us as we start thinking about these space demonstrations. The discussion about energy that was implicitly limited to powering the earth actually extends to space exploration also. We’re opening new chapters in the way JPL is thinking about future missions.
     When questioned about the experience of working together on a long-term interdisciplinary project, Hajimiri said, “The students, the postdocs, all of us have been working very closely, and we’ve been learning a great deal about each other’s domains. This results in something that’s more than the sum of its parts, both in terms of the end result of the project as well as in terms of the training the students are getting. That training is incredibly important to the future of space technology, whether it’s for wireless power transfer, communications, space structures, or all sorts of other applications we haven’t even thought about yet.”
     Atwater responded that “I had a former lifetime working in photovoltaics but never imagined in my wildest dreams that I would get involved in space until this opportunity came together. And for me, it’s been a window on a completely new world of science. That’s been tremendously exciting.
      Pelligrino added, “Sometimes it feels like we are pushing our colleagues to do something that they clearly think is impossible but later turns out not to be impossible. That is just a wonderful feeling. It’s a different kind of research, where you are doing the best you can in your own field, but you are also leveraging the interface with other fields, a collective system that really is going to benefit society. Benefiting society is a much more elaborate thing than doing good work in your own area. It’s so much more challenging.”