While a permanent, manned U.S. space station has been on drawing boards and CAD terminals for more than 20 years, getting it into orbit has proven to be an incredible challenge. Almost everything needed to build a habitable environment in space has had to be invented, including the structure itself. Having heard about NASA's need for more effective space-age materials, Jonathan Colton, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, and John D. Muzzy, professor of chemical engineering, were challenged to devise a material to be used in a truss network that would be pliable during transport, yet rigid when assembled in space. With the help of their graduate students, the researchers have blueprinted the chemical makeup and design, as well as a production process, of a material that may portend the future of construction in space. Think of an erector set, suggests Colton.
Gas supplies the pressure needed to consolidate the material.
Solar energy, obtained through mirrors reflecting the sun's rays, melts the thermoplastic resin, which fills spaces between each fiber. A solid tube-shaped strut is the result. In the laboratory, the polymer is applied to each individual fiber. In space it's melted and re-solidified. The fabrics are made to stick to one another to become one mass.