Project: ARES

Project: ARES - An Architectural Rendering of Environmental Structures on Mars

High-Level Project Summary

Based on our astronaut's limited initial resources, we have designed modifications to the original habitat to make a one-year stay on Mars possible and sustainable. These include: radiation shielding for the starting habitat and the modifications we added; an exercise and recreation area to mitigate the negative effects of the gravity and isolation on Mars; and a greenhouse for food production. With these, the challenge of surviving Mars for a year will be no less arduous, but it'll be achievable. The knowledge there is to gain on Mars is incalculable, but gaining it will require long-term human habitation. Our designs provide it, and could serve as the blueprint for future Mars habitats.

Link to Final Project

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1n7Swo_WvlJnBSOaIIVMTuYr70p4mLyUz?usp=sharing

Link to Project "Demo"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTw6sKmwp8M

Detailed Project Description

To accurately outfit our Mars habitat, we have created some additional background information and context, as well as defined some restrictions for our scenario.

Our lone astronaut has been sent to Mars on a one-year mission designed to test the long-term effects of isolation while surviving on another celestial body. Ahead of their arrival, prefabricated materials and resources were sent to the landing location, with robots helping manufacture and set up their habitat. However, due to budget restraints, this habitat is extremely basic -- only containing the required food, water, oxygen, and power to keep the astronaut alive -- and lacks proper furnishing. During a rough landing, one of their rover's wheels was damaged, and most of their tools were destroyed. The only tools the astronaut has at their disposal are three 3D printers: one for small metal objects, another for medium plastic objects, and a third for concrete objects of any size. In addition to this, we are assuming the following: these 3D printers come with some (not a lot) preloaded materials for building; the only things the habitat comes with are a bedroom and bathroom, a kitchen, an infirmary, some storage areas, and the control station for the 3D printers.

Initial Habitat Blueprint

Our goal is to design a system for this lone astronaut to upgrade his current living quarters into a more comfortable base for his year-long mission. To do this we will:

Provide blueprints for the different multi-purpose tools.
Fix the damaged Rover's wheel.
Upgrade his current housing to be more functional (gym, infirmary, etc.)
Create a greenhouse and a radiation shield for the habitat.

During the creation of our project, the tools we've used have varied as we do not have a vast knowledge of many platforms. We used Blender for size comparisons, Paint 3-D as an easier counterpart to use and create a simple model of the habitat, Easy Blue Print to create our plans, as well as sketching out our ideas on paper (like the rover wheel, tools, and habitat design). Lastly, we used LEGOs to create a model based on our habitat designs.

WIth the stage properly set, we can now turn our attention to the hazards that pose the most immediate threat to our astronaut. While his immediate needs are met -- food, water, oxygen -- living on Mars comes with a host of other dangers. The two main ones are radiation and decreased gravity, but we will also be adressing the problems of sustainable food production and the detrimental effects of confinement/isolation.

Before any of these can be tackled however, tools need to be created and the rover's wheel needs to be replaced. Firstly, our astronaut will use the materials the 3D printers already had on hand to create the tools -- with plastic handles and metal tips, and designed to be easily assembled.

Tools, Tools, pt. 2

Next, they'll recycle the damaged wheel's materials (since it wasn't fully destroyed) and use that to design another one in the 3D printers. Since this is a significantly larger object, it'll need to be constructed in parts. Firstly, the mainly-plastic treads will be reinforced with the aluminum and titanium found naturally in Mars' regolith. The wheel bearing in the center will be constructed with the metal 3D printer for greater durability, and split into assemblable parts joined together by screws. Finally, the spokes connecting the bearing to the outer rim and treads will be fully printed by the metal printer, due to their smaller size (if materials are running low, our astronaut could either scavenge their landing craft for parts or extract metals from the regolith).

Full Wheel Design, Individual Parts, Rover Model

With their new tools and a fully functioning rover, our astronaut can collect all the materials they could need and fully explore the Red Planet. But before they can, they need to address the dangers we previously mentioned. The first and most important one is the establishment of a gym area inside the habitat. Mars' decreased gravity has devastating effects on the human body -- osteoporosis, the loss of tissue mass, eye and heart diseases, and possibly immune system defficiencies -- which are difficult to counteract. The best our astronaut will be able to do in their situation is keep a strict regimen, and exercise several hours a day. To do this, they'll first need to set up a gym, in the left hemisphere of the central room in their habitat.

Next, to protect themselves from the solar particle events and the galactic cosmic radiation that Mars' atmosphere lets in, the astronaut will need to create a radiation shield for their habitat. Our design calls for the creation of a dome, made from Martian regolith, using the concrete printer outside the habitat. It'll be made out of hexagonal panels, held up by support beams, and put together with the help of the now-repaired rover. While not a perfect radiation shield, it will help reduce the dosage our astronaut receives.

Finally, the last problem that needs solving is that of sustainable food production. Up until now, the habitat has had enough food to keep the astronaut alive, but after the lengthy modifications they've made, food's running out. A greenhouse will be attached to the left of the habitat -- using the concrete printer -- connected by two airlocks (one on the habitat's side and one on the greenhouse's). According to our research, the most useful crops to grow would be potatoes, dandelions (quick growth), kale (could grow better in Martian soil). Budget-willing, our astronaut has been able to bring some of these with them. If not, then they'll have to plant some of the food the habitat has stored. Either way, Martian soil needs to be treated and fertilized. Calcium perchlorate will be removed and fertilizer will be added.

With all of these modifications, a sustainable, year-long Mars mission becomes very achievable. The 3 main dangers that astronauts will be facing on Mars are addressed in our designs, which allow for sustainability, as well as modularity. Life on Mars will never be easy (at least not until it's terraformed), but it's a challenge humans are willing to undertake. Whether it be for science, for glory, or for expanding our frontiers, human habitation on Mars starts with projects like ARES.

Space Agency Data

Firstly, we browsed through most of the resources provided in the challenge's interface as a team. We learned of Mars' extreme conditions and challenges when it comes to both construction and survival. One of the things that we noticed was how pressure seemed to be a crucial factor as certain structures may explode from too much stress. Using video documents (from Youtube, linked in the References section) we were able to see the possible solutions to it.

From there, we learned through some Mars related podcasts and university lectures, that gravity can cause many disturbances to our body (like our ear changing form to accomodate this new gravitational pull, our fluids flowing differently, higher sickness rate, etc.) which is why there needs to be medical equipment available for our astronaut (we've assumed that the astronaut's habitat comes preequipped with the medical tools to help mitigate some of these effects).

Aside from gravity and pressure, there is dust and temperature. There are airlocks which will clean astronauts and their suits from any toxic material that could have adhered to the outside of the suit. We are also counting with pre-installed heating systems for the habitat so that our astronaut does not turn into a human popsicle.

The next we learned through some internet research, is that Mars' atmospheric protection is close to none and therefore radiation is higher and stronger for structures on the planet. Since we are provided with three printers, one of which can print out of regolith mixtures (Martian concrete), we've decided that the best and most efficient course of action is the creation of a regolith dome to surround the base, since regolith is strong enough to act as a "natural barrier" against the radiation. By printing big hexagonal shapes, the dome can be built in an easier way, with supports to keep it from falling apart (put together with the help of the repaired rover).

We've linked our sources for all of these ideas in the References section.

Hackathon Journey

For us, NASA Space Apps and Project: ARES have been an interesting experience -- which is to say: something new. Why? Well, beacuse it was our first time attending one of these events.

It was amazing and fun seeing other teams work and their demo videos as well.

When we first became a team, it was amusing that we were all peers from the same institution (Pierre and Marie Curie). We thought we'd be in a mixed team, but it was comfortable working with somewhat familiar faces. Once we became a team, we had to register it. This took quite a long time! We decided to first find a challenge we'd like to pursue before choosing a name. This is how Project: ARES was created. We were inspired by our challenge of "Outfitting a Martian Habitat" and decided to use "Ares" as our name (since it is the Greek version of the Roman God, Mars). But, that's not all. Our name is an acronym, since our goal is to perform an Architectural Rendering of Environmental Structures on Mars. We were attracted to this challenge, because of its architectural and design aspects. We liked the idea of working upon a set structure and overcoming our limitations to create solutions and better living conditions. Through this, we began on our journey to learn what made Mars a dangerous neigborhood. There were things like Pressure, Temperature, Atmosphere, Radiation, Dust, Isolation, etc.

After learning of this, we designed the basic habitat and what changes we wished to perform on it. Some of these were creating rooms inside the building, adding a greenroom for the creation of a sustainable food source, fixing the Rover Wheel, and acquiring tools for the meantime.

We realized that we lost a lot of time on Challenge browsing and name making, that we had too little time left for its making. We spent a large amount of time on research and had quite the struggle with technological plartforms as well as structure deciding (we changed our floor plans at least three times. From square/rectangular rooms to our current dome-like room with a diameter of 8 meters). We though of too many things, that we had little to no time to make the solutions. So far, we created the rooms and their purposes, though we didn't create much multi-purpose rooms (We found to have enough space in our habitat). Next, we worked on what is needed for the creation of a Rover wheel, so we had to see what our dimensions limits were and worked along those lines (for this we created both a digital and physical model of the sizes of each printer capacity). Finally, for tools, we sketched the many basic tools we believe to be necessary and after some speculation, we descided on which tools to combine and what materials to use.

Now, we'd like to thank our school, Pierre and Marie Curie, for allowing us to participate and hosting this event. We'd also like to thank all the judges, staff, and coordinators for their hard work these two days; as well as all other participants for making this experience worth-while and fun, as well as creating incredible projects (Ex. Super Nova's website with an astronaut's story was creative and nice as its finality was to teach and plant the seeds of curiosity in different individuals). And last of all, we'd like to thank NASA for allowing this event to reach all corners of the world and pushing for society's education and humanity's progress.

As we said in our demo video, "Today it's Mars, tomorrow it's the universe. Let's push for the stars, To Infitinity and Beyond!"