ARCHITECTURE FOR OTHER PLANETS

摘要

NASA space architects get a chance to design and build off-the-grid prototypes that help increase our knowledge of what future space structures will be like.1 With improvements in propulsion and lowering of launch costs, it is only a matter of time before opportunities to build in Space and on other planets will abound. Assuming comfort for the occupants, environmental conditions drive architectural design. In Space the same conditions become more extreme, and there are additional constraints.2 Space architects divide environments into two major categories: zero gravity (in orbit away from a planet outside the atmosphere) and planetary surface. For zero-gravity environments, the external temperature of a structure can vary 360℃ (680℉) between the solar-illuminated and shaded sides, which could rip the structure apart with expansion and contraction if the wrong materials are chosen. In Space structures also need to be shielded from deadly solar particle events (SPEs), where energetic particles are ejected from the Sun, and galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) that cause constant radiation from all directions. Other environmental dangers include pressure differences, micrometeoroid impacts, free radical oxygen and lack of gravity.