Translator: Danielle Emtage Reviewer: Denise RQ
My Name is Aavron Estep
I am a 34 year old, non-traditional undergraduate student.
I am a junior,
and I am seeking a second career.
If you are curious as to what the difference
between a traditional and a non-traditional student is,
I can tell you that now.
The holes in my jeans are earned and not purchased.
(Laughter)
I have spent the majority of my adult life working in a medical laboratory.
I originally came to school and studied microbiology
with the intentions of going to med school.
A few years back I read the book "Physics of the Future" by Michio Kaku,
and that accelerated my interest in physics and engineering,
And that's what's brought me to OSU
to study, as he said, mechanical and aerospace engineering.
So, since you know a little bit about me, let's talk about the exploration of Mars.
As I'm sure some of you may know, and it's been in the headlines lately,
there have been plans to colonize Mars.
If you're not aware, it is the brainchild of Bas Lansdorp.
He is a Dutch entrepreneur,
he's a mechanical engineer,
and he plans on sending people on a one-way trip.
By a show of hands, how many of you here have volunteered for that one-way trip?
It is a volunteer trip.
So anybody going to Mars? Any volunteers? No?
Me neither.
And planning a trip to Mars or what I should really say first
is that while this endeavor
seems to be coming closer and closer to reality,
Bas Lansdorp has been heavily criticized
for both his financial and intellectual ability to do so.
However, this does raise some very important questions,
questions that fueled the exploration
of 3D printers on Mars for me and my group,
that is, a group of 30 students.
So, in thinking about taking a trip to Mars,
there are many factors that come into play,
and one of those factors is a very big issue.
It's an issue that all of you here are familiar with,
and all of you have experience with.
So how many of you thought
that you had something in common with planning a mission to Mars?
Anyone?
I'll tell you what it is: "What are we going to pack?"
(Laughter)
So, in making this trip to Mars, we can make certain assumptions.
One of those being
that the inhabitants' ability to explore the planet may be limited
by both the environment and also by their gear
So, a useful aid to such an explorer would be a Mars rover,
or some remotely controlled vehicle that we can send out ahead
to survey the area and understand what it is that they're getting into,
or explore beyond the limits of the explorers.
That brings us back to our original question
of "What is it that we plan on packing on this trip to Mars?
If we use the current standards for space exploration and space travel,
we can assume that we're going to bring
some pre-built equipment and an assorted box of parts, right?
So in this assorted box of parts are parts that we have determined
to be most likely to fail.
We've got this box of parts,
and we've made this trip to Mars.
It took us two years to get there.
After getting there we've done a little bit of exploration,
and we've realized the gravity of our situation, no pun intended,
and we kind of went buck-wild, we went out, did a little demolition derby
picked out a spot on a nice cliff
to watch our last sunset and freeze to death on Mars.
Well, the next day we didn't die, and we woke up,
and we see what we're left with is the first junkyard on Mars,
and a complete lack of ability to further explore the planet remotely.
So ideally,
what we should or want to be able to do is manufacture those replacement parts
or be able to build the entire platform, right there on site.
And if we used current materials that we use to build rovers on Mars,
we would be looking at bringing up metals to Mars with us,
and all the machinery necessary to mill and manufacture those parts.
So that's where a 3D printer could come in very handy.
But before we throw caution into the wind and send a printer to Mars,
we need to do some research.
There are certain things that we need to take into consideration,
before we say this is a viable option.
For starters, we could ask,
"What sort of effects might UV radiation have on the polymers that we're using
and on the structural integrity of our materials?"
On Mars we have an ozone that is less than that of ours on Earth,
and that's something that we need to explore.
But in my level of education, which is undergrad,
I doubt that the university would let me get involved with things
that involve the word "radiation".
(Laughter)
So what else can I explore?
Well, Mars has nearly a third the gravity of that of Earth,
so I could explore what effects that lesser gravity would have
on the printing process and the integrity of the material:
how are the layers of the material going to adhere to one another,
and how is that going to affect its strength?
Well, unfortunately, NASA is doing that on the International Space Station
as of September 14th of last year.
So while I have in fact received an invitation from Stratasys,
the 3D printing manufacturing company's laboratory in Houston,
I have not actually received an invitation from NASA
to their laboratory in outer space.
To that I would say,
"Stratasys has invited me, and I have a summer off,
what's the hold up?"
So what are we left with?
What are some of the other options?
We're left looking at environmental conditions and topography.
I have gone through this dialogue not because that is how I chose
to approach the choices I made
in exploration of research for this particular project,
but what it is meant to do is to bring awareness to some of the other things
that we need to look at
when we're pursuing this particular endeavor.
This is the point in my talk where I get into some technical jargon
that at this point, I still need the reference material to understand.
So in lieu of confusing us both,
I will briefly describe what it is that we are doing.
Firstly, let's talk about the conditions on Mars.
At the equator, during the summer,
it can range from -100°F all the way to 70°F,
with an average temperature of -60°.
Mars is mountainous, desert-like, canyonous,
having a canyon that's 4 times larger than the Grand Canyon,
and the largest canyon in the Solar System.
So what my group and I have set out to do,
is to test the structural integrity of the materials
using various testing methods
and taking into consideration the effects of the environmental conditions on Mars.
So while my 3D printer may stand up to certain conditions,
and we understand that it will stand up to certain conditions above freezing,
what's going to happen when we are significantly below freezing?
So what temperature is optimal for the maximum strength of my materials?
And at what point does the temperature get so low
that the material becomes brittle and therefore useless to us?
One of the other things that we need to explore
is the effects of the payload.
How big of a rover can we build with this material?
And with this increased payload,
how are these variations in temperature going to affect it:
how much can we carry,
how much more susceptible is it to damage with these added stresses,
taking into consideration the variations in temperature.
One of the other things we need to look at is
if we took this "Marver" out and we did some extended exploration
and we left it out there, what kind of effects are these cycles of temperature
going to have on those polymers and their structural integrity,
and then if it's minus 60° out and we have determined
that at this point it is too risky to operate our machinery,
do we just call the mission off for the day
and leave it there for fear of hitting a rock and doing damage to the material?
So, what I know some of you are waiting for me to say is
"Yes, I do think it is possible," or "No, I do not,"
and to that I would say,
with the research that we have collected at this point,
I would think that it is very probable
that we will be using 3D printers on Mars.
However, I will also say that the amount of research that still needs to be done,
including on my end, is extensive,
and we may possibly need to look into developing other polymers
that would be more suitable to the environmental conditions on Mars.
In closing, I would say to you that I fully expect
that on our first endeavor to Mars,
there will in fact be a 3D printer,
that we will be using 3D printed materials,
most likely on the rover, and in other avenues of our exploration.
I want to thank you guys for your time, and I hope you enjoyed the talk.
Thank you.
(Applause)