November 10, 2018
In the early days of November, great attention was drawn to the statement of the Russian State Space Corporation Roscsmos about its plans to establish a permanent tended base on the surface of the moon. Not once in the previous years, colonization of the Moon was declared one of the priority tasks of the Russian space program. Other countries are not lagging behind either: for example, in late September, NASA released their National Space Exploration Plan, which assumes manned expeditions to the moon, and in October NASA officially invited developers to design plant and equipment that could be used on the Moon. And the priority will be the projects with short term implementation - in 2019-2020.
The European Space Agency together with the agency of Aerospace Research of Mexico and the companies Airbus, Blue Origin and Vinci Construction is intending to launch a tender for technologies intended for development of the Moon in near future.
China has its own program for the development of the Moon. At the beginning of this year, the Lunar base simulation experiment was completed at Beijing University. There, four people lived for 200 days in the "Yugun-1" ("Lunar Palace") module.
In 2020, Japan is expecting to start construction of a lunar base, where only robots will operate.
Private companies are also in the process. In 2023, Blue Origin is intending to land the first module on the Moon, which will be the beginning of the project on colonization. It is premature to discuss the feasibility of these plans; their implementation is subject to too many factors: political, economic, technical. But it seems interesting to briefly describe the problems, which in any case will face the creators of a permanent lunar base.
Long ago, humans got interested in the idea that it would be nice to settle on the moon. Back in the 17th century, English scholar John Wilkins in his "A Discovery of a New World, or A Discourse Tending to Prove, that 'tis Probable there may be another Habitat World in the Moon" predicted moving of Earth population on the Moon.
However, Wilkins and many subsequent authors, the Moon seemed to be a much more habitable place than in reality. In the works of the 17-19 century, it is possible to breathe freely on the Moon, there are animals and plants as a source of food, and the problem may only be relationships with the indigenous population - Selenites.
The more people learn about the moon, the more difficult it seems to develop it. But at the same time new attractive sides of the Moon are discovered. Now helium-3 serves as the main. The significant amount of this isotope in the samples of lunar rocks delivered to Earth in the 1970s, caused great attention, because helium-3 is a promising fuel for thermonuclear synthesis. On Earth helium-3 cannot be found in required quantities (practically, we don’t have it here at all, there is 35000 tons of for the entire Earth atmosphere), while lunar regolith (Lunar soil) contains about 0.1 grams per ton helium-3. Among the initial problems for the founders of the lunar base will be change of lunar day and night. They last for 354 hours. Therefore, for over two weeks of night-time the lunar station will have no opportunity to use the energy generated by solar panels. However, near the lunar poles there are areas lit constantly or almost all the time.
Day and night shift also means temperature variations. This variation is serious on the Moon: from −178 °C at night and to +127 °C during the daylight time. The equipment and inhabitants of the Lunar station must be protected from such extreme temperatures. A logical solution would be locating the bases under the Moon surface, Underground at 1 metre depth, the temperatures seems to be almost constant, though low, and varies subject to the latitudes from -53° C at equator to -123°C at Lunar poles.
By burying the base underground, we will resolve a number of other problems. For instance, we would reduce the meteor threat. The Moon Atmosphere (if such a rarefied atmosphere can be called atmosphere) would not protect the colonists from meteorites, and even micrometeorites can cause significant damage to the station. Scales of meteorite bombardments should not be underestimated. In 2016, scholars used Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter equipment and analysed changes on the Moon pictures, taken for the past seven years and came to a conclusion that the frequency of meteorites falling onto the Moon is minimum a hundred times higher than it had been considered before.
The Moon does not protect its inhabitants from solar radiation either, because our satellite does not have its own magnetosphere. The flow of sun-emitted particles would be dangerous not only for people on the lunar surface, but also for electronic devices.
On the moon, water will also have to be pumped from subsoil. Luckily, recent research showed that there are quite significant reserves of water located relatively shallow under the surface of the moon. However, it is in a bound condition in minerals. So it will be a separate task. It is not without reason the European Space Agency has a special new section in their Lunar technologies tenders for mining of water.
It is not yet clear how low gravity force on the Moon will effect on human health (approximately one sixth of the Earth gravity). Experience in long space travels shows that microgravity causes a number of changes in human organism, including loss of muscular and bone weight and suppression of the immune system. If can afford some fantasy and imagine a Lunar colony with permanently living population, where children would be born, then we would face the gravity force problem at a new level for effect of low gravity to development of human embryo has not yet been studied.
The Moon dust is a standalone problem. The scholars suspect that it would have higher abrasion activity than the dust particles on Earth for the dust particles on the Moon do not get rounded due to wind erosion. Because the Lunar dust would be accelerating the plant and equipment wear, damaging optical devices, degrade pressure integrity of compounds. If we plan to build a manned mission, we should take into account the effect of dust to human health. Even as a result of short contact with the dust on the Moon the astronauts, who had visited it had tears on their eyes and had pain in their throats. Harrison Schmitt, member of “Apollo-17” described this state as Lunar “hay fever.”
Last May, GeoHealth journal published a research, where the scholars attempted to assess a potential damage of the Lunar dust to living organisms. Of course, the authors of the article did not have real Lunar dust, therefore, they used some Earth analogue in their experiments (a number of producers like University of Central Florida or University of New South Wales prepare and offer to the researcher simulations of Lunar and Mars soil based on the existing data, in addition, sometimes they use basalt volcanic rocks that are suitable for their properties).
Cellular cultures from cells of human lungs and brain neurons of mice were subjects to dust impact. In all cases, the living cells were seriously damaged. The samples, where particle sizes were smallest, turned out to be the most dangerous. In tests, when such particles were used, up to 90% of cells were destroyed. Of course, the authors acknowledge that they do not have a reliable explanation as to why this particular dust damages worst. They only assume that the dust “may initiate inflammation response inside the cell or generate free radicals, which separate electrons from molecules and prevent their normal working.” Earlier studies, also conducted using the Earth dust, showed that dust particles less than 2.5-3 mcm cannot be withdrawn from human lungs, and get attached to the tissues and cause local inflammation.
However, the scholars hope to obtain benefit from Lunar soil as well. An experiment was successfully completed at the German Aerospace Centre, where they produce bricks using 3-D printing from an analogue of Lunar dust. They are intending to build future Lunar Station using such bricks. The energy to produce these bricks was obtained from the Sun. 147 bended mirrors focused solar rays to melt the dust granules.
The Lunar soil may be used for obtaining oxygen. Derek Fray and his colleagues from Cambridge University demonstrated such method in 2009.
The electro-chemical installation with calcium-titanate electrodes with calcium ruthenate admixture, developed by this group allows obtaining pure oxygen on anodes. According to the calculations, during a year, three of such units would be generating a ton of oxygen from three tons of regolith. In addition, solar panel units will be sufficient to supply enough power to the process.
For food supplies of the inhabited colony and partial oxygen top-up, it would be good to bring vegetation to the Moon. Again, we would face a number of problems. Growing plants in closed premises would require using natural solar light is not possible for the nights, lets recall, last for 354 hours, and does not correspond to vegetation circadian rhythms. In 1970’s, Soviet scholars conducted a number of experiments on growing plants in conditions, when light and dark periods lasted for 354 hours, and reported some success. But these works did not get continuation. Lack of normal soil and pollinators, and significant temperature drops also make it difficult to grow vegetation.
Translated into English by Muhiddin Ganiev