I made light of this yesterday, but I do take it seriously. This is the type of spacesuit that I was writing about. It has already been invented, but it looks like it could use some improvements. Like shielding and a powerful source of energy to operate the life support machinery inside.
The spacesuit should be the main home of an astronaut. Why? Well, the amount of mass that is required in order to properly shield crew members make it too prohibitive to cover a large interior space. A small amount of matter, which could be well south of 1000 lbs, could be used for shielding instead. This would be a big help in not only an astronaut's health on long missions, but in reducing mass so that interplanetary exploration could proceed.
A radical idea ( according to some ) would be to make it a nuclear powered spacesuit. The power generated could recycle the oxygen from the exhaled carbon dioxide and make it unnecessary to keep a large supply of oxygen in the suit. Here's a solution: It turns out that the plutonium that the rover Curiosity uses is not dangerous to humans and has actually been used in pacemakers. This could be a power source that could clean up biological wastes and make them safe to store aboard the spacesuit until they can be removed.
Perhaps the removal can take place once or twice a day. Since the astronauts are spending all their time in the suits, the shielding won't be needed for a pressurized "bathroom" where they could visit to do the necessary chores of maintaining the body and the spacesuit. Other than these visits, a crew member would stay in the suits continually.
It may taking some getting used to, however.
Al Fin: "Cowboy Commentary", aka "Eat your veggies" The Flag banner is posted in order to defy those who would make patriotic symbols illegal or disreputable.
No comments:
Post a Comment