In an effort towards its future manned missions to the moon, Indian space agency ISRO has come up with a novel way to make ¡®space bricks¡¯. The said bricks are built from a sustainable process and will eventually allow astronauts to create load bearing structures on the lunar surface.
The process for making the space bricks is a joint innovation of a team of researchers from the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bengaluru.
The method apparently enables the production of load bearing bricks through the use of the soil on the moon. It mixes the soil with bacteria, guar gum as well as urea from human urine to make the bricks, according to reports.
The method describes the use of guar gum as cement in this case, further lowering the carbon footprint of the production method. The bacteria is used to further crystalize the brick in the desired shape.
Production of the space bricks on the lunar surface will be a huge plus in the endeavour to setup a human base on the moon. Since the transportation of construction materials to the moon proves to be very costly, the space bricks will drastically bring down the cost of such missions.
To come up with the unique solution, scientists at IISC and ISRO mixed the bacteria with a simulant of lunar soil. Required urea and calcium sources were then added to the mixture.?
It was further treated with gum extracted from locally sourced guar beans. The gum managed to increase the strength of the material by serving as a scaffold for carbonate precipitation, mentions a TOI report.
The mixture was then kept in incubation for a few days, until it was found to possess significant strength and machinability.
¡°Our material could be fabricated into any freeform shape using a simple lathe. This is advantageous because this circumvents the need for specialised moulds ¨C a common problem when trying to make a variety of shapes by casting,¡± said Koushik Viswanathan, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, IISc and an author of the study. This would in turn also eliminate the need for fastening mechanisms in the desired structure.
A similar method was recently brought to light by a team of European scientists. The research indicated that astronauts¡¯ urine could be used in the concrete of lunar structures, as the urea could be used as a plasticizer, an additive that can be mixed into concrete for softening and making it more elastic before it hardens.?