The process uses urea, urine and moon soil as raw materials for moonlighting
Bengaluru:
A team of researchers from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) has developed a sustainable process for creating brick-like structures on the moon, according to IISc.
It exploits lunar soil, and uses bacteria and guar beans to consolidate the soil into potentially viable structures, IISc in Bengaluru said in a statement.
“These space rocks could eventually be used to gather structures for habitation on the lunar surface, the researchers suggest,” it said.
“It’s really exciting because it brings together two different fields of biology and mechanical engineering,” says Aloke Kumar, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, IISc, one of the authors of two studies recently published in ” Ceramics International ” and ” PLOS One ”.
Space exploration has grown exponentially in the previous century.
With the Earth’s resources rapidly declining, scientists have only intensified their efforts to inhabit the moon and possibly other planets.
The cost of shipping one pound of material to the outdoor space is approximately Rs 7.5 lakh, according to the statement.
The process developed by the IISc and ISRO team uses urea that can be generated from human urine and lunar soil as raw materials for accumulation on the moon’s surface, it said.
This significantly reduces the total expenditure. The process also has a lower carbon footprint because it uses guar gum instead of cement for support.
This could also be used to make durable bricks on Earth, it was explained.
Some microorganisms can produce minerals through metabolic pathways.
One such bacterium, ” Sporosarcina pasteurii ”, produces calcium carbonate crystals through a metabolic pathway called the ureolytic cycle: it uses urea and calcium to form these crystals as by-products of the pathway.
“Living organisms have been involved in such mineral deposits since the beginning of the Cambrian period, and modern science has now found a use for them,” says Mr Kumar.
To harness this power, Kumar and colleagues at IISc have partnered with ISRO scientists Arjun Dey and I Venugopal. They first mixed the bacteria with a lunar soil simulator. Then they added the required urea and calcium sources along with gum extract from locally-sourced guarbons.
The guar gum was added to increase the strength of the material by serving as a scaffolding for precipitation of carbonate.
The final product obtained after a few days of incubation was found to have significant strength and machinability, the statement said.
“Our material could be made into any free mold shape using a simple lathe. This is advantageous because it eliminates the need for specialized molds a general problem when trying to create a variety of shapes by casting.
This capability could also be used to create complex interlocking structures for construction on the moon, without the need for additional fastening mechanisms, “explains Koushik Viswanathan, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, IISc, another author.
The PLOSOnestudy, developed by Rashmi Dikshit, a DBT-BioCARe Fellow at IISc, also investigated the use of other locally available soil bacteria in place of ” S.pasteurii ”.
After testing several soil samples in Bengaluru, the researchers found an ideal candidate with similar characteristics: ” Bacillus velezensis ”.
Just a bottle of ” S.pasteurii ” can cost Rs 50,000; ” B. velezensis ” on the other hand, is about ten times more expensive, the researchers say.
“We have quite some distance to go before we look at foreign habitats. Our next step is to create larger bricks with a more automated and parallel production process,” says Mr Kumar.
“At the same time, we also want to improve the strength of these bricks and test them under varying charge conditions such as impact and possible moon shocks.”
.
