Paving the road for large-area sintering of regolith.
Building on the Moon will depend on the materials already there rather than on cargo shipped from Earth. PAVER explores how lunar regolith can be turned directly into infrastructure: a laser with a spot of up to 10 cm sinters the loose lunar soil into a solid, trafficable surface.
Paved areas like these would give rovers and crews efficient transport routes and landing zones that are far less dusty than driving directly on the lunar sand — dust being one of the biggest hazards for equipment and people on the Moon.
Project Years
June 2021 – December 2022
Funding
European Space Agency (ESA) – Open Space Innovation Platform (OSIP), Off-Earth Manufacturing campaign
Consortium
- TU Clausthal – Germany
- BAM Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung – Germany
- Aalen University – Germany
- LIQUIFER Systems Group – Austria
LIQUIFER Team
Waltraut Hoheneder, Barbara Imhof, René Waclavicek, Monika Brandić Lipińska
Credits
Visualization: LIQUIFER
Further Information
Paving the Road – LIQUIFER Systems Group
