End-to-end mission design for microbial ISRU activities as preparation for a moon village

Abstract

In situ resource utilization (ISRU) increasingly features as an element of human long-term exploration and settlement missions to the lunar surface. In this study, all requirements to test a novel, biological approach for ISRU are validated, and an end-to-end mission architecture is proposed. The general mission consists of a lander with a fully autonomous bioreactor able to process lunar regolith and extract elemental iron. The elemental iron could either be stored or directly utilized to generate iron wires or construction material. To maximize the success rate of this mission, potential landing sites for future missions are studied, and technical details (thermal radiation, shielding, power-supply) are analyzed. The final section will assess the potential mission architecture (orbit, rocket, lander, timeframe). This design might not only be one step further towards an international "Moon Village", but may also enable similar missions to ultimately colonize Mars and further explore our solar system.

Theoretical design of a space bioprocessing system to produce recombinant proteins

“…The copyright holder for this preprint this version posted September 22, 2022. ; https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09. 20.508767 doi: bioRxiv preprint 4 systems must minimize cost and crew time, while assuring astronaut safety and addressing effects of increased radiation and reduced gravity 14-17 . Previous space biomanufacturing studies and reviews evaluated large-scale mission design 8,18,19 , microbial growth kinetics 20 , and bioreactor design [20][21][22] . Extracting products of interest at sufficient quality is equally essential to develop biomanufacturing.…”

“…Previous space biomanufacturing studies and reviews evaluated large-scale mission design 8,18,19 , microbial growth kinetics 20 , and bioreactor design 20–22 . Extracting products of interest at sufficient quality is equally essential to develop biomanufacturing.…”

Iron can be microbially extracted from Lunar and Martian regolith simulants and 3D printed into tough structural materials

“…Microbial production processes do not necessarily require sophisticated factories, high energy investment, or toxic chemicals [4]. Therefore, bacterial methodologies are increasingly being applied to terrestrial applications [12][13][14][15] and may be even more valuable for space exploration and colonialization [16], where resupply and a limiting initial amount of materials are major constraints [4,17]. The research presented here aims to develop a new approach to extract iron from Martian regolith and use it in 3D printing applications (Fig 1).…”

Mining moon & mars with microbes: Biological approaches to extract iron from Lunar and Martian regolith

“…Combined with a lander concept (Lehner et al, 2019) , this provides a framework for future evaluations of biomining processes in space exploration and a basis for evaluation of other bioprocesses.…”