Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Emerging Tech
  3. News

Beyond science fiction: A look at the future of NASA technology

Francis Bea
By
Future of NASA technology

There are critics out there complaining about NASA’s inability to innovate simply due to the grounding of explorations to the moon. But a crop of 28 funded projects by NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts Program will make anyone think twice about the organization’s aptitude for forward-thinking ideas.

Now that the most difficult part of Curiosity’s successful trip to Mars has come to pass, and placed NASA back on the radar of countless space enthusiasts throughout the world, NASA has an untold number of projects, not related to Curiosity, up its sleeve. And if its latest funded projects are any indication, some of these concepts appear to have been taken right out of a science fiction movie.

Recommended Videos

The award recipients were separated by two categories, Phase 1 and Phase 2.

Related

PHASE 1

Phase 1 fellows are those whose concept proposals won NASA’s $100,000 grant for one year of further the research to discover the proposals’ feasibility. Among the Phase 1 proposals, the following caught our eye.

Venus Landsailing Rover

Proposed by NASA’s Glenn Research Center (GRC), is a practical ways to landsail above or through the dense atmosphere of Venus, the second rock from the sun.

HOMES – Holographic Optical Method Exoplanet Spectroscopy

This proposal suggests a technology that will enable scientists to study planets outside of our solar system using holographic projections or representations of said planets.

Exploration of Under-Ice Regions with Ocean Profiling Agents (EUROPA)

Researchers at Virgina Polytechnic Institute and Virginia State University are researching feasible ways to explore what’s beneath the icy surface of Jupiter’s sixth closest moon. What the researchers suggest building is a submarine destined for Europa.

Water Walls: Highly Reliable and Massively Redundant Life Support Architecture

water walls in space
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Intended for long-duration space missions, waste, fecal matter and urine need an efficient way of being recycled as the consequences of simply disposing of the grey matter onto an extraterrestrial planet is unknown. NASA’s Ames Research Center (ARC) has proposed the construction of a habitat where waste water is treated within its walls. Osmosis would filter out usable water, while the waste would be re-purposed as a radiation shield.

PHASE 2

Phase 2 proposals are ideas from Phase 1 of last year that have shown promise and will be rewarded $500,000 for further development and analysis – a potential precursor to the development of a prototype. Here are some Phase 2 ideas that we were intrigued by.

The Fusion Driven Rocket: Nuclear Propulsion through Direct Conversion of Fusion Energy

fusion rocket nasa
Image used with permission by copyright holder

MSNW scientists have been researching and prototyping is a rocket propulsion system that would be propelled by fusion energy. What are the benefits of this technology? According to the research, existing technology can send a mission to Mars in approximately 210 days. A fusion driven rocket, however, would theoretically enable NASA to reach Mars in a blazing-fast 30 days.

Printable Spacecraft: Flexible Electronic Platforms for NASA Missions

The future of manufacturing could be in 3D printing. Today, our technological capabilities today enable us to print flexible substrates from silicon and glass to metal and biological inks. Eventually 3D printing technology could be scaled up to print an entire spacecraft.

Variable Vector Countermeasure Suit (V2Suit) for Space Habitation and Exploration

 v2suit

As you surely already know, objects in space are subject to weightlessness. In this odd environment, astronauts can often become disoriented when attempting to position themselves within the confines of a spacecraft. Using gyroscopes and accelerometers to provide resistance in space, the V2Suit will mimic the sensation of gravity for its wearers.

The development of the V2Suit is evidence that NASA has human-manned, deep-space exploration missions in mind. (Currently, they only use robots.)

“These selections represent the best and most creative new ideas for future technologies that have the potential to radically improve how NASA missions explore new frontiers,” said Michael Gazarik, director of NASA’s Space Technology Program in a statement.

The listed projects are still in early development. And if any reach the prototyping stage, it won’t be for another 10 or more years that we would see their use in an actual mission. But with Obama’s plans to send a human mission to Mars by 2030, we wouldn’t be surprised if the V2Suit, Printable Spacecraft, and other sci-fi-like technologies are among those that end up aiding the human exploration of the Great Unknown.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Francis Bea
Francis Bea
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Francis got his first taste of the tech industry in a failed attempt at a startup during his time as a student at the…
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft to perform an asteroid sampling rehearsal
This artist’s concept shows the trajectory and configuration of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft during Checkpoint rehearsal, which is the first time the mission will practice the initial steps for collecting a sample from asteroid Bennu.

This summer, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will attempt to touch down onto the surface of asteroid Bennu and collect a sample to be brought back to Earth for the first time. But it's no easy task to maneuver a spacecraft so close to an asteroid, getting it close enough to grab a sample without impacting too hard and damaging the craft. Not to mention the role of microgravity created by the asteroid's mass.

So this week, NASA will perform a test run of the touchdown, called the "Checkpoint" rehearsal. This will bring OSIRIS-REx the closest it has ever come to Bennu, coming as close as within 243 feet of the asteroid.

Read more
NASA recruits gamers to help identify and map the world’s corals
A user playing the new NeMO-Net game that helps NASA classify the world's coral from their own home

One devastating way in which climate change is affecting the planet is by killing off coral reefs around the world. But while there are projects underway to halt the damage done to corals, it's hard for scientists to know how widespread the problem is as we don't have a good map of coral systems.

For several years, NASA has been developing a system for imaging coral ecosystems from the air using instruments attached to drones or aircraft. These instrument have collected plenty of data, but the images of corals need to be identified and classified before they can be used for research.

Read more
How NASA’s VIPER rover will tackle the problem of moon dust
Robotics engineer Jason Schuler performs a preliminary test to prepare for dust testing of various seals for the wheel motors on NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, or VIPER

NASA is preparing to send astronauts back to the moon by 2024 as part of the Artemis program. But there's one challenge of lunar exploration we haven't solved yet: How to deal with moon dust.

The surface of the moon is covered in loose soil, also known as regolith, which kicks up clouds of dust whenever anything is moved over it. This dust gets everywhere and sticks to absolutely everything, because of the ultraviolet radiation from the sun which positively charges dust particles and makes them sticky. The particles also remain sharp due to the lack of wind erosion, making them abrasive.

Read more