The future of space travel is the future of spacesuits

Humans have not evolved in space, but in a “Goldilocks” habitable zone there are ideal conditions for life. The space environment seems designed to damage our bodies. How do we prevent it as space exploration starts to develop? How do we survive microgravity and radiation? How do we create a spacecraft?

With the invaluable help of expert Dr. Dava Newman, who holds the Apollo Professor of Astronautics chair at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and is the director of the MIT Media Lab, we are understanding the role of spacesuits in exoplanetary environments: orbit, Moon, Mars.

Mars: the challenge of going… and coming back

One of Nature’s contributions to human life on earth is a wonderful life support system for our planet, which produces the oxygen we need, removes waste CO2 and provides basic nutrients. In the vacuum of space, this does not exist.

As Dava J. Newman points out, the simplest Mars mission requires “slightly under four years.” We can’t move a significant population of the Earth, as they do in The Expanse series with the generational ship Nauvoo, a rotating O’Neil cylinder that provides gravity, farmland, and radiation shielding.

On the left, current state of the art in human space ‘exploration’. On the right, two sci-fi proposals, the first one more likely and affordable with our technology, based on rotation.[1] 

On these trips, the lack of gravity becomes a problem. “Humans have evolved in a 1 g environment,” notes Dava, so “the most worrisome thing is muscle and bone loss.” On 6-month missions to the ISS, 30% muscle losses have been recorded, and bone density losses of between 1 % and 2 % per month.

It can be mitigated, in part, with exercise, as well as different pharmacological compounds. Fluid redistribution is more complicated but new suits can probably help. For the past few years, Dava Newman has been testing an intravehicular activity suit prototype called the Gravity Loading Countermeasure Skinsuit (GLCS).

Elastic and skin-tight by design, its purpose is to simulate some of the effects of the Earth’s gravity. For example, compressing the body vertically by means of elastic fabrics that produce a static load.

Moon: Houston, we need new suits

“The spacesuit is the smallest spaceship,” states Dava J. Newman in her TED talk How to Design a Spacesuit. The question of how to create a minimal spaceship is a textile problem, of patterning, of materials that can be sewn together and are biocompatible.

The current suits for spacewalks—formally ‘extravehicular activity (EVA)—or those for jumping on the Moon, are exceptionally limited. As seen in the video, they are often even comical and an object of amusement.

“The conventional spacesuit is a big, pressurized shell with gas,” synthesizes Dava J. Newman on the phone, who qualifies “it’s a marvel: it provides your oxygen, removes carbon dioxide, keeps you warm, enables humidity control, etc., but it greatly limits any kind of mobility.” It’s not functional, nor is it useful for exploration. Including the helmet. The new suits must be comfortable, adhere to the body friction-less, form a second skin, and protect us.

No lunar visibility, a radiation issue

There is much talk about how we are going to protect ourselves from radiation under the lunar regolith by building inflatable structures surrounded by selenite material; or inside Martian lava tubes that will shield us from radiation. But little about visible radiation, light, and our problem with it outside the Earth’s atmosphere.

On the Moon, an intermediate step between Earth and Mars, we will not be able to perceive depth without references. Human eyes and what they are able to interpret in the brain are not prepared for the lunar darkness or the brightness of its surface illuminated by the sun.

That’s why Dava J. Newman talks about how a type of ‘depth camera’ is being developed that works with stereo imaging. The goal is to augment in much the same way that thermal cameras allow us to ‘see’ outside the visible light spectrum.

Enhancing our human perception on the lunar surface is going to be critical for surface missions, as is protecting the optic nerve in orbit. (For a variety of reasons, the ocular nerve is quite affected by weightlessness). As Dava points out, “we need suits for planetary exploration” that are comfortable. And, in the meantime, robots will be used.

At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology they are also testing solutions such as micro-robots with projects like AstroAnt, a “miniaturized robotic swarm” capable of moving across different surfaces, following the line of thought of John von Neumann, who pointed out the need for small self-replicating robots for space exploration. Imagine being able to launch hordes of devices to build domes and laboratories years before the arrival of humans.

Floating away from ground protection

At the moment, Mars is the goal, the Moon is the first stop, but we are still tied to space stations. And there has been in Low Earth Orbit on ISS another problem related to radiation that affects biological tissues.

All kinds of tests are being done, including some very interesting ones with fungal melanin (fungus) shields to armor both spacecraft and astronaut suits. The goal is to build safe environments in orbit for humans. Current space stations are still very vulnerable to this risk, as they are to the recyclability of basic elements.

What is the point of innovating in space exploration suits?

Often, an unfounded criticism of space investment is that there are other, more pressing problems to be solved on Earth, which is undoubtedly true. And what good is that? Yet many of the solutions we currently use come from space.

As Dava J. Newman points out, “we’re really pushing the state of the art and manufacturing and materials” with these suits, so we may see applications of these same fabrics in healthcare settings, extreme sports, isolated environments or closed environments (e.g., earthquake rescue) in some time.

Among the thousands of tools, we use on Earth that come from space, Dava Newman highlights two fundamental ones:

• The first is the enormous knowledge we are gaining from the human genome, which is helping to treat people all over the planet.
• The second is more urgent: the engineering behind the water treatment that provides drinking water to millions of people, resulting from the Closed Life Support System.