Astronaut's urine is more useful than the Earth

In space, everything needs to be utilized, including astronauts' waste.

Since US President Donald Trump made his plan to return to the Moon in 2024, NASA and its partners have been working very hard to keep pace. The space agency even considered building a fixed space station on the Moon to serve as a base for operations on Mars.

If you transport everything needed from Earth, the cost will be very high. Therefore, scientists will have to be creative with limited resources on the lunar surface. The dust on the Moon is a great building material, and the water that exists in the form of the southernmost ice can turn into rocket fuel. But the hottest item among them is most likely astronaut urine.

Urine can become very important on the Moon. (Photo: Wired).

New building materials

Earlier this year, a team of European researchers demonstrated that urea, the second most common compound in human urine after water, can be mixed with moon dirt and used for construction. The resulting material is a geopolymer , which has properties similar to concrete and is likely to be used to build landing zones, habitats and other structures on the Moon.

On Earth, geopolymer often uses fly ash, coal waste products mixed with water and some other compounds to create concrete replacement materials. The surface layer of the Moon can also replace fly ash, but water is not easily found.

"Water is extremely valuable on the Moon. So one of our main goals for this study is to reduce the amount of water needed to produce geopolymer," said Marlies Arnhof, a member of the Vu Agency research group. European pillar (ESA) shared with Wired.

Superplastics are materials used to reduce the water content of concrete and geophysics while maintaining their flowability. On Earth, superplastics are often difficult to pronounce substances like naphthalene and polycarboxylate. But as Arnhof and her colleagues have discovered, urea also works well and is available on the Moon, as long as there are astronauts here.

Urine plays an important role in building a fixed space station on the Moon. (Photo: ESA).

Instead of filtering contaminants in astronaut urine and recycling it into sewage, urine can be stored in a tank and harvested urea. To test the idea, the researchers mixed synthetic urea powder with surface soil emulsifiers to create cylindrical structures the size of a fist and let them dry. They then used 3D printers to create a texture, similar to the way the Moon was built. As a result, the material is quite durable, avoiding cracking.

Materials from urine can also help astronauts avoid dangerous ionizing radiation on the lunar surface. The moon does not have a strong atmosphere or magnetic field to deflect radiation from the sun, which means that astronauts are at a higher risk of cancer when on the lunar surface. Geopolymer has been used to store nuclear waste on Earth, and on the Moon it will protect astronauts.

The European Space Agency is conducting further research to determine whether this material is effective in radiation shielding. The agency also needs to prove that this material can be produced on the Moon. In the study, geopolymer was created at room temperature in an outdoor environment. But 3D printing is much harder in low gravity vacuum environments. Geopolymer also needs to be able to withstand extreme temperature fluctuations on the Moon, ranging from -170 to 130 degrees Celsius.

There are many other effects

Astronaut urine has many other uses besides construction. One option is recycling for drinking, just like the astronauts do on the International Space Station. Although there is water in the form of the rock at the southern tip of the Moon, it is not known if this water can be extracted and used, since it contains toxic substances such as mercury and hydrogen sulfide, which need to be filtered until it is safe to use. safe to humans.

Urine can also be recycled into drinking water for astronauts in space. (Photo: NASA).

In addition, urine can be used to grow food. Urea breaks down into ammonia and carbon dioxide, and some bacteria can convert ammonia into nitrate salts, a common fertilizer. This means it can be used in a closed system, recycled urine and urea used as raw material for plant fertilizers.

Researchers at the German Aerospace Center have successfully grown vegetables with human urine for years. In late 2018, they launched a satellite to test a miniature version of a urine-powered greenhouse on Earth's orbit.

On the barren Moon, every drop of liquid is precious. Therefore, whether used as a building material or fertilizer, it seems that urine will have a huge role when people engage in the solar system.