After more than 17 years of operations on the International Space Station ISS, ESA and its inter-national partners are working on a return to the Moon with the now starting construction of the Gateway, that will serve to perform robotic and human excursions to the surface of the Moon.

However, with the aim of making permanent human presence on the Moon, it is to be expected that extravehicular activity (EVA) will last longer and on a more regular basis than those performed by the Apollo astronauts who already visited our celestial neighbour fifty years ago. The Apollo missions clearly showed that EVA equipment needs to be adapted for long duration missions on this hostile environment, particularly when managing lunar dust. Furthermore, advances in material science in the last fifty years lead to garments with novel functionalities[1]. These offer the opportunity to design EVA equipment that is functional and mass efficient.

The subject of the project (Planetary Exploration Textiles - PExTex) was the selection of materials for an EVA spacesuit for lunar surface activities through an extensive testing effort such as radiation behaviour, reaction to abrasion, triboelectric properties, hot and cold high vacuum exposition with off-gassing measurements, microbial growth potential and others. PExTex project focusses on suit materials for EVA on the lunar surface. Selected outcomes can be considered for potential Martian EVA suits or other space applications (e.g. such as materials for inflatable habitats) or terrestrial applications. Selected materials include stacks of layers such as PBO, Twaron, PTFE and others Moreover, an important part of the project was also development of non-standard testing platforms, in particular for impact of abrasive lunar dust on materials.

References

[1] P. Weiss, M. Peer Mohamed, T. Gobert, Y. Chouard, N. Singh, T. Chalal, S. Schmied, M. Schweins, T. Stegmaier, G. T. Gresser, G. Groemer, N. Sejkora, S. Das, R. Rampini, M. Holynska Adv. Mat. Technol., 2020, 2000028.