Aspect view of the entire system, worn as a backpack. Credit score: Karen Morales
The brand new spacesuit urine filtration system by Cornell researchers recycles astronauts’ urine into drinkable water, aiming to enhance consolation and effectivity on future Moon and Mars missions.
At present, astronauts should relieve themselves inside their spacesuits throughout spacewalks. This isn’t solely uncomfortable and unhygienic, but in addition wasteful. Not like the wastewater administration system on the Worldwide House Station (ISS), the water from urine throughout spacewalks will not be recycled.
Researchers at Cornell are addressing this subject with a novel urine assortment and filtration system impressed by the ‘stillsuits’ from the sci-fi franchise Dune. Like these ‘stillsuits’, their prototype absorbs and purifies urine, and recycles it into consuming water.
Sofia Etlin, a analysis workers member at Weill Cornell Medication and Cornell College and the primary writer of the research, defined, “The design features a vacuum-based exterior catheter that results in a mixed forward-reverse osmosis unit, offering a steady provide of potable water with a number of security mechanisms to make sure astronaut wellbeing.”
This new design was just lately printed in Frontiers in House Applied sciences.
Urine assortment cups for the Most Absorbency Garment for males. Credit score: Luca Bielski
Future Missions and Present Challenges
In 2025 and 2026, NASA is planning for the Artemis II and III missions, the place a crew will orbit the Moon and land on its south pole, respectively. These missions are anticipated to be adopted by crewed missions to Mars by the early 2030s. Nonetheless, astronauts have lengthy complained a few lack of consolation and hygiene of the prevailing most absorbency garment (MAG) – the waste administration system of conventional NASA spacesuits –in use for the reason that late Nineteen Seventies – which capabilities like a multi-layered grownup diaper made from superabsorbent polymer.
Rear view of the entire system, worn as a backpack. Credit score: Karen Morales
New Options for Previous Issues
“The MAG has reportedly leaked and prompted well being points comparable to urinary tract infections and gastrointestinal misery. Moreover, astronauts at present have just one liter of water accessible of their in-suit drink luggage. That is inadequate for the deliberate, longer-lasting lunar spacewalks, which might final ten hours, and even as much as 24 hours in an emergency,” mentioned Etlin.
Astronauts have additionally requested that the time wanted to fill and de-gas the in-suit drink luggage be decreased in future spacesuits and {that a} separate provide of non-caffeinated high-energy drinks be added.
Urine assortment garment prototype. Credit score: Claire Walter
Modern Design for Urine Assortment
With all these goals in thoughts, Etlin and colleagues have now designed a urine assortment gadget, together with an undergarment made from a number of layers of versatile material. This connects to a group cup (with a special form and dimension for ladies and men) of molded silicone, to suit across the genitalia.
The internal face of the gathering cup is lined with polyester microfiber or a nylon-spandex mix, to attract urine away from the physique and in direction of the internal cup’s internal face, from the place it’s sucked by a vacuum pump. An RFID tag, linked to an absorbent hydrogel, reacts to moisture by activating the pump.
As soon as collected, the urine is diverted to the urine filtration system, the place it will get recycled with an effectivity of 87% by means of a two-step, built-in ahead and reverse osmosis filtration system. This makes use of a focus gradient to take away water from urine, plus a pump to separate water from salt. The purified water is then enriched in electrolytes and pumped into the in-suit drink bag, once more accessible for consumption. Gathering and purifying 500ml of urine takes solely 5 minutes.
Testing and Implementation of the New System
The system, which integrates management pumps, sensors, and a liquid-crystal show display screen, is powered by a 20.5V battery with a capability of 40 amp-hours. Its whole dimension is 38 by 23 by 23 cm, with a weight of roughly eight kilograms: sufficiently compact and light-weight to be carried on the again of a spacesuit.
Now that the prototype is offered, the brand new design will be examined underneath simulated situations, and subsequently throughout actual spacewalks.
“Our system will be examined in simulated microgravity situations, as microgravity is the first house issue we should account for. These exams will make sure the system’s performance and security earlier than it’s deployed in precise house missions,” concluded Dr Christopher E Mason, a professor on the identical institute as Etlin and the research’s lead writer.
Reference: “Enhanced astronaut hygiene and mission effectivity: a novel method to in-suit waste administration and water restoration in spacewalks” by Sofia Etlin, Luca Bielski, Julianna Rose, Karen Morales, Avery Belman, Emma Alexander, Emma Li, Richard Lin, Krishna Patel, Stephanie Rakhmonova, Claire Walter and Christopher E. Mason, 15 Might 2024, Frontiers in House Applied sciences.
DOI: 10.3389/frspt.2024.1391200
