Aurelia Institute, a Boston-based nonprofit space startup, wants to revolutionize space architecture through the use of self-constructing, endlessly-customizable smart tiles that don’t require human supervision.
Why It Flies: The new space race is not about just getting to places like the Moon, but colonizing them. And, constructing space stations in orbit and buildings on far-off planets is a difficult, costly, and laborious task. Letting structures build themselves could put spacefaring into hyperspeed.
Behind the Design: Aurelia Institute CEO Ariel Ekblaw, chief designer Sana Sharma, and advisory member Danielle DeLatte launched the company while they were grad students at MIT, reports Fast Company.
The company’s flagship development are “magnetized computerized tiles that self-assemble in orbit into changeable geodesic spheres called ‘TESSERAE.’”
The tiles, shaped in either hexagons or pentagons, can be launched into space, deploy a net or balloon to keep them together in orbit, and then initiate a program to autonomously attract to each other and connect into sphere-shaped structures.
Each tile is outfitted with various sensors to ensure that they all make a successful connection to other tiles. If the connection isn’t successful, they simply try again.
Tiles can pop off and be reconfigured to create new structures as needed. So, an astronaut can be in a pressurized section of the station, while the tiles are constructing a new area.
The Future: Handsized-versions of the tiles — which Ekblaw describes as “space Legos that build themselves in orbit” — have already been successfully tested in microgravity aboard the ISS. Aurelia is still working on building the full-scale 37-foot tiles and how to seal and pressurize the sTESSERAE, so there’s still a ways to go before the tech is ready for primetime. But an eventual rollout could be key to creating a space port between Earth and Mars.
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