moon_camp

Moon Camp Explorers Gallery 2019-2020

In Moon Camp Explorers each team’s mission is to 3D design a complete Moon Camp using Tinkercad. They also have to explain how they will use local resources, protect astronauts from the dangerous of space and describe the living and working facilities.

Team: ASEA EXPLORERS

AeroSpace Explorers Academy  Kerman    Iran Third Place – Non-ESA Member States

External link for 3d

Project description

Moon, is the key for our questions about beginning of solar system. Moon camp will facilitate this aim while it will be a guide line for future space explorations. We plan to build moon camp with changeable location capability around the moon. So astronauts can explore all around the moon. Moon camp will move on a zip line like telecabin (Cable car). The lava tubes are like stations of the moon camp and this telecabin will transport between these stations. We have utility sites in lunar poles which supply electrical power, water extraction and treatment plant and oxygen production plant to facilitate life support conditions and will transfer the moon camp by pipes and cables attached to the zip line. We design moon camp for three people like minimum population of “ISS” to avoid psycho-social problems, although we can provide facility for 4 people because we foresight for feature explorations.

Where do you want to build your Moon Camp?

Lunar lava tubes

Why did you choose this location?

Removable camping moon camp will change its location between lava tubes all around the moon. The lava tube is covered by very thick moon shell, which is a natural protection against impacts and cosmic radiation. So, it can protect our staff. The special structure of the lava tube allows a relatively little temperature fluctuation. So, the temperature condition inside is more controllable. It means it’s a suitable location for lunar base. Our utility sites including solar power plant which generate power by photovoltaic panels are located in the lunar poles because there is sun shine all day except lunar eclipses.

Water
Food
Electricity
Air

Water extraction and treatment system are located in the utility site at the poles of the moon. There is plenty of ice there, so we put this system there. We extract ice water from the depths of the moon and melt and treat it to obtain liquid water, and transfer it to people and plants. This saves money, fuel, and space. The ideas for the sewer system of the moon camp is the electrolysis and separate hydrogen and oxygen and enter to a fuel cell to generate electricity. That way we make profitable use of all the resources and equipment.

Our food production method is based on two types: aeroponic plant implantation and laboratory meat production. The aeroponic systems are located on the poles of the moon. There are better conditions for growth. In this method, the root of the plants are suspended in air and water which contain necessary minerals is sprayed to them. The method of producing laboratory meat is to obtain stem cells from animals in an environment rich in amino acids, sugars and minerals derived from animal embryos and from biological scaffolds to differentiate them into cells. Muscle is used and finally artificial meat is obtained.

We generate needed electricity in two ways: fuel cells and solar panels. Solar power is the primary generation system and the fuel cell is the secondary system. We place our solar photovoltaic panels on the poles of the moon and transfer electricity to the camp, which saves space. A fuel cell is a device which convert chemical energy into electrical energy. We electrolyze water to get hydrogen, oxygen in fuel cells. Hydrogen in the anode pole reacts on a catalyst to produce four positive and negative ions. At the cathode, oxygen reacts with ions and electrons to produce water and heat.

Growing plants produce enough oxygen and can also work as an air conditioner, but the amount of oxygen produced for our camp is not enough, so we plan to use another way to produce air. Algae is a great solution to produce oxygen for our camp. They also use carbon dioxide, so we can use them to freshen the air. Algae is a source of protein and as astronauts need it. They can be eaten as food .Third: we recycle carbon dioxide exhaled by astronauts to get oxygen. Forth: by heating regolith we can extract oxygen for respiration.

How do you plan to build your Moon Camp? Which materials would you use?

Moon soil that is called regolith is a good material for 3d printing. It contains silicon, iron, and aluminum. So, we can use to build our moon camp. We can send a 3d printer from Earth to the moon and start printing our moon camp using regolith. Meanwhile we define the lava tubes that we want to go inside and start to build our zip line above them. The pole of zip line can shrink like a telescope in the event of asteroids impacts.

The Moon environment is very dangerous for the astronauts. Explain how your Moon Camp will protect them.

Because of cosmic and solar radiation, we place our camp underground also we use polyethylene in the hull of our camp to avoid these dangers when they go on the surface. Hitting by asteroids is solved by going underground. To save the poles of zip line from asteroids, they are designed to perform like a telescope which can shrink to avoid asteroids danger. And also if we had the problem with the zip line the camp can move on the surface on its wheel. There is primary infrastructure in the camp while the camp is disconnected from utility site, accidentally.

Describe a day on the Moon for one of your Moon Camp astronauts

First of all you need to have a clock to simulate the time intervals for you. Imagine, you wake up and do the routines you do on earth. After that you have to eat breakfast. The breakfast is produced by moon camp’s farm. You and your partners should go to the moon camp’s farm and bring some vegetables, fruits and grains to eat. When you eat your breakfast you have to exercise for digest. You exercise over treadmill and bicycle. After that you should do some works: 1- farming: You have to plant and take care of plants. 2- You have to learn how to live in moon and what are the problems. 3- Meal lab: Food produced by meal lab and you should make artificial meals from planted protein. 4- Finding solar system’s history: You should do researches in moon’s asteroids and moon’s soil to learn more about our solar system, 5- Hobbies, etc.
Then you go back for lunch. The lunch produced from the meat brought from Lab and vegetables from the Farm. In the afternoon, you have to work again. After your work, you have to do aerobic for your health to be fleshed. Then you are free to create funny videos, communicate with your family, rest, etc. For your dinner you have a low calorie food that is vegetarian. After that you should exercise to digest. You should do bicycle. When you want to sleep, you go to your bed and sleep with your companions.


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