NASA, US Universities to Construct Infrastructure on Moon

• 28 February 2022
• Construction Focus
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Three US university-led proposals have been selected by NASA to develop technologies for living and working on the moon, according to a NASA announcement on 18 February.

The selected projects cover three topics laid out in the solicitation. Each team will receive up to US$2 million, awarded as grants, over two years to develop their proposed technologies.

The three projects are:

Autonomous Construction
Humans living on the moon will need structures like habitats and landing pads, which can be built more efficiently if they’re constructed autonomously by robots. The Colorado School of Mines will develop tools and methods for autonomous landing pad construction on the moon’s surface.

Extracting Resources
The Missouri University of Science and Technology will use magnetic and electrostatic technologies to separate minerals containing calcium and aluminum from the moon’s soil to extract materials suitable for construction on the lunar surface.

Extremely Cold Electronics
Without an atmosphere, temperatures during the lunar night plummet to hundreds of degrees Fahrenheit below zero, which is too cold for conventional electronics. Auburn University will take advantage of knowledge from recent lunar missions and other cold-temperature projects to create new electronics that are highly reliable and tolerant of low temperatures.

The projects are part of Nasa’s Artemis program, which aims to send astronauts to the moon’s lunar south pole, which would be the first landing there since 1972.

 

• Technology and Engineering