Space Agriculture for Manned Space Exploration on Mars

Abstract

Concept of space agriculture is discussed for habitation on Mars. Space agriculture enables human to live and survive comfortably with biological and ecological functions. Water and gas are revitalized by photosynthetic process of plants. Hyper-thermophilic aerobic composting bacteria drive recycling loop of metabolic waste of human and inedible biomass to cultivate plants. Trees and insects play important role in space agriculture as suppliers of additional oxygen, wooden materials, and animal protein as food sources. Marine macro-algae provide sodium and potassium which might become deficient in space agriculture. Space agriculture does not necessarily aim to achieve 100% closure of materials recycle, but utilizes Martian resources to supplement loss in the loop and thus makes the scale of the system enlarge without importing any materials from Earth. Conceptual design and trade study on candidate subsystems are reported. Development plan to achieve such space agriculture in Mars is proposed. First, Earth-based study and experimental work should solve some essential questions and then simulation and verification should be thoroughly accomplished on orbiting platforms and at Moon base.