Planes on Titan and Pipelines on the Moon: NASA Considering Some Wild Future Tech

The TitanAir idea for exploring Saturn’s moon Titan.
Illustration: Quinn Morley

The way forward for area exploration requires huge concepts, and NASA has no objection to contemplating a number of the largest concepts on the market. The area company’s Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program exists for this very objective, and it has chosen the following crop of ideas worthy of an preliminary examine.

The newest spherical of NIAC grants have been awarded to 14 analysis groups, every receiving $175,000 to additional develop their ideas, NASA announced yesterday. Of the 14, 10 are first-time NIAC recipients. These are all preliminary Phase I research, which must be accomplished inside 9 months.

“These initial Phase I NIAC studies help NASA determine whether these futuristic ideas could set the stage for future space exploration capabilities and enable amazing new missions,” Michael LaPointe, program govt for NIAC, mentioned within the assertion.

Success in Phase I might see a few of these ideas transfer to Phase II, through which the researchers are granted extra funding and two extra years to additional develop their bold schemes. Only a choose few make it to 3rd base: Phase III.

NIAC grants usually cowl a large spectrum of space-based pursuits, and the picks for this yr are not any totally different. NASA strikes a steadiness between Earth and area science, area exploration, and, of explicit significance to the area company, the furthering of its Artemis agenda, beneath which NASA is in search of a sustainable and extended return to the Moon.

Fly AirTitan

Among the extra eye-catching ideas is the AirTitan project envisioned by planetary scientist Quinn Morley of Planet Enterprises. Various ideas for exploring Saturn’s moon Titan have been proposed earlier than, and NASA is already within the midst of making ready the Dragonfly mission, however Morley’s thought is discernibly subsequent stage. The autonomous AirTitan car can be simply as snug flying in Titan’s thick environment as it might be crusing on its methane lakes.

 Artist’s concept of a lake at the north pole of Saturn’s moon Titan.

Artist’s idea of a lake on the north pole of Saturn’s moon Titan.
Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Morley envisions day by day flights for AirTitan, because it seamlessly transitions from watercraft (er, methanecraft?) to plane. In addition to sampling Titan’s complicated environment, the probe would gather and analyze liquid samples. Indeed, Titan is of serious astrobiological curiosity, as it might host prebiotic natural chemistry. That mentioned, the thick oily lakes might current an issue, however an inflatable wing liner might “offer resiliency and mitigate sludge buildup problems,” in response to Morley.

Satellite megaconstellations for astronomy

NASA can be within the Great Observatory for Long Wavelengths (GO-LoW) idea proposed by Mary Knapp from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This space-based observatory would encompass 1000’s of equivalent satellites working on the fifth Earth-Sun Lagrange level (L5). By trying to find radio emissions at frequencies between 100 kHz and 15 MHz, the satellite tv for pc array might examine the magnetic fields of distant exoplanets and detect rocky exoplanets much like our personal.

Depiction of Great Observatory for Long Wavelengths (GO-LoW) with low-frequency vector sensors.

Depiction of Great Observatory for Long Wavelengths (GO-LoW) with low-frequency vector sensors.
Graphic: Mary Knapp

The “fail fast, fail cheap approach is a drastic departure from traditional practices,” Knapp writes, including that “SpaceX and other new entrants to the launch vehicle market have pushed the market to lower and lower costs, through manufacturing innovations and the economics of scale behind mega-constellations.”

Pellet-beam propulsion

NASA desires Artur Davoyan from the University of California, Los Angeles, to additional develop his pellet-beam propulsion system idea, which the mechanical and aerospace engineer envisions as means for transporting heavy spacecraft to targets throughout the photo voltaic system and even into interstellar area. The proposed propulsion system would make use of a pellet beam—a beam of microscopic hypervelocity particles propelled by lasers—to push spacecraft to desired areas. Unlike different ideas, the pellet beam permits for the transport of heavy spacecraft, which Davoyan says “substantially increases the scope of possible missions.”

Depiction of Pellet-Beam Propulsion for Breakthrough Space Exploration

Depiction of Pellet-Beam Propulsion for Breakthrough Space Exploration
Graphic: Artur Davoyan

Pellet-beam propulsion might take payloads to the outer planets in lower than a yr and to distances farther than 100 occasions the Earth-Sun distance (au) in about three years, he claims. For the present examine, Davoyan will contemplate the efficacy of utilizing the pellet-beam to move a 1-ton payload to 500 au in lower than 20 years. For reference, Pluto is “just” 35.6 au from Earth, whereas NASA’s Voyager 2, which launched 45 years in the past, is now roughly 133 au from Earth.

An oxygen pipeline on the lunar south pole

A key precedence for NASA’s Artemis program is to take care of a sustainable presence on the Moon, a problem that the area company might overcome through the use of on-site sources, reminiscent of extracting oxygen from the lunar regolith (soil) and water-ice. Peter Curreri from Lunar Resources in Houston agrees, however he’s not a fan of NASA’s present plan, as he explains:

Current funded efforts for in-situ [on-site] oxygen extraction consists of bottling the oxygen in compressed fuel tanks or to liquefy and retailer it in dewars. Either method requires trucking tanks or dewars to varied services to be used. The technique of shifting this oxygen on rovers is extra vitality intensive than the extraction course of and is regarded as the MOST costly facet in acquiring in-situ oxygen to be used on the Moon contemplating the lengthy distances a useful resource extraction space might be from a human habitat or liquification plant.

Instead, Curreri proposes a lunar pipeline, which might be constructed on the lunar south pole, as that’s the place many of the Moon’s water-ice is situated. The idea attracted NASA’s consideration, ensuing within the Phase I analysis grant.

Depiction of the Lunar South Pole Oxygen Pipeline.

Depiction of the Lunar South Pole Oxygen Pipeline.
Image: Peter Curreri

The pipelines would supply settlers with fixed entry to treasured oxygen, whereas additionally linking scattered settlements. “A lunar pipeline has never been pursued and will revolutionize lunar surface operations for the Artemis program and reduce cost and risk,” Curreri says.

Growing bricks on Mars

NASA additionally has its sights set on Mars, so it desires Congrui Grace Jin, an engineer from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, to flesh out her thought for rising bricks on Mars, versus importing them from Earth. Indeed, settlers might want to construct buildings on Mars, however that will require the launching of supplies on separate missions, including to prices. More virtually, Jin’s analysis “proposes that, rather than shipping prefabricated outfitting elements to Mars, habitat outfitting can be realized by in-situ construction using cyanobacteria and fungi as building agents.”

These microbes can be coaxed into producing biominerals and polymers for gluing the Martian regolith into constructing blocks. “These self-growing building blocks can later be assembled into various structures, such as floors, walls, partitions, and furniture,” Jin writes.

These are just a few of the 14 ideas chosen by NASA for this yr’s NIAC grant. You can study extra in regards to the different analysis proposals here. And to be clear, these ideas haven’t been authorised as precise tasks—all of them nonetheless must go NASA’s sniff check. Some and probably all of those concepts could die on the vine, however these kinds of speculations are all the time worthwhile and a sneak preview to what could finally be potential.

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https://gizmodo.com/nasa-advanced-concepts-lunar-pipeline-airtitan-1849970366