{"id":141313,"date":"2024-05-01T10:59:04","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T14:59:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=141313"},"modified":"2025-04-14T14:30:30","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T18:30:30","slug":"ucf-planetary-scientists-innovations-help-pave-the-way-for-economic-activity-beyond-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-planetary-scientists-innovations-help-pave-the-way-for-economic-activity-beyond-earth\/","title":{"rendered":"麻豆原创 Planetary Scientist\u2019s Innovations Help Pave the Way for Economic Activity Beyond Earth"},"content":{"rendered":"

Imagine 麻豆原创 researchers living and working on the moon and companies mining and using lunar resources to launch rockets further into space<\/a>. That\u2019s what 麻豆原创 planetary scientist Phil Metzger \u201900MS\u201905PhD<\/strong> predicts in the not-too-distant future.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithin a few decades, that\u2019ll be a real thing when you look at the trajectory of the space industry and how access to space is becoming less costly,\u201d Metzger says. \u201cEven transportation to the moon is about to be revolutionized.\u201d<\/p>\n

Metzger, who directs\u00a0the Stephen W. Hawking Center for Microgravity Research and Education<\/a> \u2014 a joint venture of 麻豆原创 and Space Florida that conducts and facilitates research in microgravity sciences \u2014 has developed inventions to meet those predictions while also relieving the Earth of many environmental burdens.<\/p>\n

Here are some of Metzger\u2019s latest inventions designed to help cost-effectively gather, use and manage resources, such as ice for water and fuel and lunar soil for building materials.<\/p>\n

Extracting Lunar Ice for Water and Fuel<\/strong><\/p>\n

Does \u201cAqua Factorem<\/em>!\u201d sound familiar to you Harry Potter fans? That\u2019s the name that Metzger and his team gave to their device that\u2019s a patented, low-cost system for extracting water from the moon. In the realm of Harry Potter, Aqua Factorem<\/em> could translate to \u201cWater Maker,\u201d and the innovation paves the way for companies to operate facilities in space by harvesting and using the moon\u2019s resources.<\/p>\n

More than a decade ago, NASA discovered that the shadowy craters of the moon contained ice, metals and other valuable materials to support further space exploration. At that time, Metzger and other researchers started studying ice on the moon.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of different people were proposing ways to get the ice out of the soil to make rocket fuel,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Through the years, Metzger says that a key obstacle has always been the amount of power needed to harvest and convert those resources into water, fuel and even air.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes huge amounts of power to go down into these craters,\u201d Metzger says. \u201cAnd how do you get the power down into these dark craters on the moon? We were looking at things like beaming energy with lasers or gigantic mirrors to reflect the sunlight.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOne day, I was thinking about the physical state of the ice in the lunar soil and realized that it\u2019s granular, you know, grains of ice mixed in the soil rather than ice coating the grains of soil,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Based on that geological insight, Metzger developed and led a NASA-funded study on methods for getting the ice out of the soil much less expensively.<\/p>\n

\u201cRather than heating it until it vaporizes in a lunar vacuum, catching the vapor and then refreezing it, we could simply sort the grains using several processes,\u201d he says. \u201cI proposed that we could reduce the energy by about 99%, and our study showed that we can reduce the power by 98.3%. Pretty darn good. So that means you don\u2019t need these expensive types of energy systems. Instead, you can simply use fuel cells and just drive the fuel cells in and out of the craters.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fuel cells would be regenerable, he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cUsing sunlight, you split water into hydrogen and oxygen, and then you get the energy back by letting the hydrogen and oxygen recombine across a membrane,\u201d Metzger says. \u201cThat fuel cell then drives the equipment in the crater from which you\u2019re getting more water and bringing it back out again. The water also becomes your medium for transporting the energy to run the whole operation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Metzger says using the moon\u2019s resources for rocket fuel could help reduce the number of Earth\u2019s rocket launches and in turn, help to protect its atmosphere.<\/p>\n

With Aqua Factorem, Metzger says that a lunar rover could carry the device into one of the dark craters and set it on the\u00a0ground. The rover would dig up soil that contains ice (frozen water that\u2019s essentially asteroid and comet residue) and place it into the device, which would then separate the ice from the soil, making frozen water available, hence its name.<\/p>\n

Later, another rover would take the ice and drive it outside the dark crater to a processing station in the sunlight.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would clean up the ice, electrolyze it, and then chill that down to liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen for rocket fuel,\u201d Metzger says.<\/p>\n

In that scenario, he says a lander would transport the rocket fuel off the moon to a spacecraft to provide a boost service and then fly back and land on the moon on one tank of gas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe proved it can do that and then refuel and do it again,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019re providing a method to boost spacecraft from the moon instead of launching rocket fuel from the Earth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Metzger says that the operation reduces the energy required to harvest ice on the moon and would be profitable. It would also benefit the Earth\u2019s atmosphere and environment by reducing the number of launches, he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe quantified how much energy the whole thing would require and how big the solar cells would have to be,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The team\u2019s analysis of all the different system components, their power, mass and cost of making everything showed a viable architecture, relying only on the moon\u2019s resources.<\/p>\n

With that, Metzger says the technology has drawn the interest of at least 100 companies, many looking to mine the moon and asteroids.<\/p>\n

As for the invention\u2019s name, Metzger asked colleagues at the Florida Space Institute for ideas. \u201cSomebody said, \u2018Why don\u2019t you name it like in Harry Potter, one of those spells? Like Wingardium Leviosa<\/em>?\u2019\u201d So, the team looked up Latin words for \u201cwater makers\u201d and named the invention Aqua Factorem<\/em>,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like magic because you pour in the soil, and the system magically separates the ice grains from the soil grains,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

For more information about the invention, see the\u00a0technology sheet<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Aqua Factorem <\/em><\/strong>YouTube video<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Sintering Lunar Soil for Building Projects on the Moon<\/strong><\/p>\n

Metzger\u2019s work on the ice extraction problem led to the next invention, a method for sintering lunar soil for construction materials. During the Aqua Factorem<\/em> research, Metzger and his team ran experiments to magnetically separate the moon\u2019s soil and ice.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo sort the lunar sand grains from the ice grains, we use a combination of magnetic and electric vibration or electrostatics,\u201d he says. \u201cWe showed that it\u2019s very efficient. You can get a high rate of flow of the soil through the magnetic field and get good separation.\u201d<\/p>\n

At that time, he recalled a study he had done at NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) years earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn that study, one of the tasks that the team wanted me to do was figure out the best way to build a landing pad on the moon,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

In the JPL study, Metzger found several ways to build landing pads.<\/p>\n

\u201cSintering, spraying polymer on the soil to stick the soil together, baking the soil in an oven to make pavers,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

He even considered using microwaves, but that required too much energy. The JPL team eventually found that the cost of the power and equipment on the moon was not competitive.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so again, it came down to finding a way to do it with less energy,\u201d he says. \u201cThat was when I realized if we magnetically sort the sand, the magnetic soil can absorb microwaves better than the nonmagnetic soil.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seemed highly likely that the more magnetic soil would absorb the microwaves better, so that was my hypothesis,\u201d Metzger says.<\/p>\n

Based on that, he and the 麻豆原创 team sought and obtained funding, performed experiments, and proved that the new process could reduce the power by 70%.<\/p>\n

He also analyzed actual lunar soil, studying the microwave susceptibility and the magnetic susceptibility of all the different minerals and glass in the soil.<\/p>\n

\u201cI created a model that predicts that if you used real lunar soil, you would indeed reduce the energy by 70%,\u201d he says. \u201cThe model nearly matched the experimental results. After that came an economic analysis. It showed that the cost of building a landing pad on the moon could be reduced by several hundred million dollars by using this process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Metzger describes the process for making a viable, affordable landing pad using the moon\u2019s resources.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou scoop up the soil and run it through a magnetic field to separate the nonmagnetic soil from the magnetic soil,\u201d he says. \u201cYou lay down the nonmagnetic soil first, then the magnetic soil on top of that, and then apply microwaves to it. The better absorption in the top layer causes the soil to melt into lava. The process results in the lava solidifying into rock, a solid pad like concrete.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a bonus, Metzger pointed out that the cost-saving landing pads could help toward cooperation among nations.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can build landing pads all around the moon and make them international so that any country is allowed to use them,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

For more information about the invention, see the\u00a0technology sheet<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ongoing and Related Work<\/strong><\/p>\n

As for the future, Metzger plans to build the Stephen W. Hawking Center for Microgravity Research and Education into something worthy of both the late theoretical physicist and cosmologist, and 麻豆原创.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a vital need for academia to extend into space,\u201d he says. \u201cWe\u2019re moving economic activity beyond Earth, so that\u2019s going to be very good for the planet. It will give us new abilities to reduce our environmental footprint, to understand our environmental impact on the Earth and how to manage it. It\u2019s also going to create a more vibrant civilization.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c麻豆原创 is going to play a leading role in advancing academia beyond planet Earth over the coming decades, and I\u2019m excited to be at the university for that reason,\u201d Metzger adds. \u201cIt\u2019s positioned to truly be the space university, playing an important role as we go into this new world, starting with the moon and asteroids, and then Mars and beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked what he thinks industry in space will look like, Metzger has an unexpected answer.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome people think you can move most of industry into space and then bring manufactured goods back down from space. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s a very viable idea. I could be wrong,\u201d he says. \u201cInstead, it would be better to put computing and power generation into space. You can beam clean energy down from space, and you can beam data down from space.\u201d<\/p>\n

He explains computer growth on Earth will prove to be an energy hog.<\/p>\n

\u201cComputing is growing exponentially, especially with artificial intelligence,\u201d he says. \u201cWithin a few decades, more energy will be spent computing than everything else combined. So, by moving computing off the Earth into space, we can reduce our environmental burden on the planet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also want to reduce the number of rocket launches because rocket launches harm the atmosphere,\u201d Metzger says.<\/p>\n

He thinks that 10-20 years from now, we could be launching 12 giant rockets a day.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat will be above the limit \u2015 where it is harming the atmosphere,\u201d Metzger says. \u201cWe can reduce that by about a factor of 10 if we start using resources on the moon and asteroids and launching rockets from those locations. We can protect Earth\u2019s atmosphere by using resources in space.\u201d<\/p>\n

Researcher\u2019s Credentials<\/strong><\/p>\n

With almost 30 years of experience at NASA, Metzger has been helping to make the dream of space travel a reality. The planetary scientist started as part of the Space Shuttle team right out of college. After retiring early, he joined the 麻豆原创\u00a0Florida Space Institute<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0in 2014 and became The Hawking Center director in late 2023. His research includes studies of extraterrestrial soil mechanics, characterizing lunar and Martian soil simulants, and modeling the migration of space equipment in the airless and microgravity environment.<\/p>\n

When Metzger joined 麻豆原创 in 2014, he started as a research professor in planetary science and space technology at the Florida Space Institute. He researches asteroid, lunar and Martian regolith and exploration technology. He has also developed small spacecraft technology to mine and use water for steam propulsion. A 麻豆原创 Knight through and through, Metzger holds a doctorate<\/a> and master\u2019s degree in physics<\/a> from 麻豆原创.<\/p>\n

Technology Available for License<\/strong><\/p>\n

To learn more about Metzger\u2019s work and additional potential licensing or sponsored research opportunities, contact\u00a0Raju Nagaiah<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0(raju@ucf.edu) at (407) 882-0593.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some of Metzger\u2019s latest inventions are designed to help cost-effectively gather, use and manage resources, such as ice for water and fuel and lunar soil for building materials.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":141315,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"lazy_load_responsive_images_disabled":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[5,23,24],"tags":[6982,1775,3488,15551,14916,4361],"tu_author":[],"class_list":["post-141313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colleges","category-research","category-science-technology","tag-center-for-microgravity-research-and-education","tag-florida-space-instit","tag-office-of-technology-transfer","tag-phil-metzger","tag-research","tag-space"],"yoast_head":"\n麻豆原创 Planetary Scientist\u2019s Innovations Help Pave the Way for 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