Browsing by Author "Holt, Chris"

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Automated Carbon Formation Reactor Facilitates Closed-Loop Oxygen Recovery to Enable Long-Duration Manned Missions
(2023 International Conference on Environmental Systems, 2023-07-16) Powell, Mary; Holt, Chris; Matter, Paul; Hery, Travis; Baumgartner, Toby; Goldman, Jacob; Weiser, Carolyn; Wiswesser, Charlie; Kayuha, Elek; Holt, Makenzie
The vast majority of space vehicles and habitats have been launched and operated by nations for scientific and exploratory purposes. Consequently, their form has been shaped by the constraints posed by the scientific and diplomatic needs of the mission as well as the physical limitations of their launch and operation. These constraints have resulted in a homogenous appearance of space architecture, with either a single monolithic hull or a central, cylindrical axis with branching, pressure-cylinder modules. Recently, an influx of private investment in space has resulted in low-cost access to orbit and an emerging space services economy that has in turn led to a surge of interest in commercial space habitat design. With an increasingly diverse pool of spaceflight participants, the design of these future space habitats must evolve past the ‘orbital laboratory’ to instead accommodate a wide range of participants and reasons for spaceflight. This work presents a space habitat assessment methodology and systematically reviews space habitat concepts throughout modern history, including flight-proven spacecraft, ideas from NASA competitions over four decades, technical workshops, industry concepts, terrestrial analogues, and notable, credible designs from science fiction. Ninety concepts were collected and characterized based on figures of merit such as pressurized volume, occupancy, location, structural geometries, and purpose. From this broad search, gaps between current capabilities and future-leaning designs are identified for research and development. Broad categories of trends and opportunities are identified for the space architecture community–namely, determining the technologies needed to enable the next generation of space habitats. This paper presents the foundation of a space architecture database collected from concepts across the field, analyzes the resultant technology gap, and proposes R&D workstreams for meaningfully democratizing access to space via in-space infrastructure that can scale up habitat occupancy.
Continued Development of an Automated Carbon Formation Reactor as a Life Support Technologies Solution for Long-Duration Manned Missions and In-Situ Resource Utilization
(2024 International Conference on Environmnetal Systems, 2024-07-21) Powell, Mary; Matter, Paul; Holt, Chris; Wiswesser, Charlie; Burke, Matt; Baumgartner, Dylan; Couch, Brandon; Oberhaus, Kaila; Thompson, Collin; Holt, Makenzie
Long-duration manned missions have a critical need for life support loop closure both for the journey, and for long-term survival in lunar and Martian surface colonies. The current state-of-the-art technology on board the International Space Station (ISS) is the Sabatier system, which has the potential for 50% oxygen recovery. This will not be sufficient to sustain manned flight beyond low Earth orbit. Therefore, this system must be greatly modified, or other life support system technologies must be developed with a higher potential for oxygen recovery. These systems may take the form of a Series Bosch system that has the potential to achieve 100% oxygen recovery from metabolic carbon dioxide, or a carbothermal reduction process to extract oxygen from surface regolith. pH Matter's automated Carbon Formation Reactor (CFR) is a critical component of both systems, providing both solid carbon that can be used as a feedstock for carbothermal reduction as well as water, which can be electrolyzed to release oxygen. pH Matter's automated CFR has been demonstrated at the four-crew member scale at both ambient pressure and at an elevated pressure of 200psia. The pressurized system was developed for use on the lunar or Martian surface for in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), while the ambient pressure system was developed for use in human-occupied habitats. The team will demonstrate the highly automated CFR reactor system at the forty-crew member ISRU-scale in May 2024.