RII Track-4:NSF:Planetary Robotic Construction on the Moon and Mars Using 3D Printed Waterless Concrete

As part of the ongoing Artemis program, NASA is planning to send astronauts back to the Moon in the near future to establish a long-term presence at the Lunar south pole. The Moon offers a unique opportunity for scientific research and provides valuable insights that can inform future missions to more challenging destinations such as Mars. Space exploration offers the opportunity to gain valuable knowledge about our solar system's early history, the development of celestial bodies, and the potential existence of valuable resources which could benefit life on Earth.

To promote a sustained presence on the Moon, robotic construction technologies will be needed to build a variety of supporting structures such as habitats and radiation shields. This project promotes the progress of science by exploring an innovative robotic construction technology, which uses in-situ raw materials already available on the surface of the Moon and Mars, namely, sulfur and regolith.

Sulfur is considered as a viable material for space construction, since previous space discoveries have verified the presence of sulfur on the Moon and Mars. The activities during this two-year NSF EPSCoR RII Track-4 Research Fellowship program will provide various opportunities for graduate, undergraduate, and high school students to learn about new construction technologies, such as large-scale 3D printing and novel engineering solutions for space and terrestrial construction.

This Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-4 EPSCoR Research Fellows project will provide a fellowship to an Assistant Professor and training for a graduate student at Louisiana State University. This work will be conducted in collaboration with researchers at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama. This study is focused on understanding the interplay between material-process-environment factors during construction 3D printing (C3DP) using sulfur-regolith materials.

In close collaboration with researchers from NASA Marshall Space Flight center, in this research, advanced tests will be carried out under simulated planetary conditions to evaluate the performance of 3D printed regolith-sulfur elements. Currently, there is very limited data available on the space-resilience of 3D printed construction materials, as well as the governing principles and the influence of various material, process, and environmental factors on the structural and durability properties of 3D printed structures.

This knowledge gap exists mainly due to the lack of research data and the fundamental differences between the water-based concrete, which is commonly used for C3DP on Earth, and sulfur-regolith concrete. Sulfur concrete is a waterless thermoplastic material with great potential for space construction as well as some applications on Earth. The planned research will provide a fundamental understanding of the impacts of high-temperature sulfur concrete printing process parameters and environmental factors such as near-vacuum conditions, extreme temperature swings, and micrometeorite impacts on the performance of 3D printed structures.

The comprehensive data and findings from the integrated project activities will significantly enhance our understanding of process parameters and processing effects in waterless sulfur concrete 3D printing on the Moon, Mars, and Earth.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.