The “Architecture for Human Space Exploration” course is devoted to the design of a resilient and sustainable infrastructure for manned missions on the Moon and Mars. This new design challenge requires a new design holistic approach. Space Architecture relies on some fundamental pillars that are intrinsically interconnected: space sciences, engineering, industrial design, ergonomics, medicine, psychology, and art.

Students will be challenged to design in team within a cross-disciplinary environment at different scales, from urban to architecture and interior design, and build on the knowledge and technologies developed for space applications. Challenging both space and terrestrial architectures to consider the relationships between human activities and the resources which support them.

Developing architectural solutions for the Moon and Mars that will in turn advance thinking about terrestrial concerns on Earth. The challenges in solving how a human settlement might evolve in the extreme conditions of space enables more intelligent methodologies for terrestrial utilization and promises to directly impact how we approach challenges on Earth, while meeting the UN Sustainable Development Goals of Agenda 2030.

The outcomes of “Architecture for Human Space Exploration” course will be innovative space architecture systems that enable a sustainable human presence on the Moon and Mars, envisioning as possible timeline respectively 2030 and 2050.

The projects will have to solve for: design criteria of space architectures; masterplan design of the settlements; optimal use of In Situ Resources Utilization; Human Factor Design principles for integrated design solutions; complexity management through integrated design workflows and multi-objective optimization processes; autonomous robotic structures; Concept of Operation of the manned mission; Life Cycle Assessment of the proposed architectural solution.

Students will be asked to engage in collaborative teamwork activities and critical thinking to share their knowledges, skills and experiences in order to successfully develop and deploy their projects.

Several decades after the first space age, there is renewed interest in space exploration and specifically in future human habitation far beyond the Earth’s surface. NASA and ESA are currently designing for an ambitious target: to send a manned mission to the Moon in this decade and allow for future human habitats and even cities on Mars by 2050. This challenging, multi-disciplinary problem requires expertise from a wide variety of fields including aerospace engineering, environmental engineering, social science, nuclear engineering, urban planning, design, architecture – and especially structural engineering. Unlike structural engineering for the built environment on Earth, there are virtually zero rules of thumb or design precedents to draw on for construction on Mars or the Moon. 

The course framework will cover: 

• Fundamentals of system architecture and computational design methods for optimized architectural solutions. 
• Fundamentals of In Situ Resources Utilization for assessment and exploitation of construction materials and water. 
• Fundamentals of Human Factor Design principles for integrated design solutions to solve psychological impact. 
• Fundamentals of construction autonomy of structures for unmanned missions before human arrival. 
• Design Thinking Workshops with experts belonging to ASI, ESA, NASA JPL, architecture firms and academic institutions (MIT, Media Lab, SICSA). 
• Design and prototype a human habitat that can be deployed on the Moon by 2030 or Mars by 2050. 

This course will be a collaborative classroom Pilot project with Massachusetts Institute of Technology  "Design Exploration:towards a Moon Architecture" open course seminar held by Prof. Joseph Paradiso, Valentina Sumini and Guillermo Trotti.

The students will develop a multidisciplinary design project accross scales focusing on human space exploration.

Evaluation criteria of the design project.

When considering a permanent settlement on another planet, one of the crucial aspects involves the evaluation of the total life cycle of the structure. That is, taking a system from conception through retirement and disposition or the recycling of the system and its components. Many factors affecting system life cannot be predicted due to the nature of the Lunar/Martian environment and inability to realistically assess the system before it is built and utilized. Therefore, even if the challenges in space exploration are very peculiar, the colonization of satellites and planets could teach us to be wiser in our consumption of natural resources, pushing us to pursue efficiency and sustainability here on Earth. 

The results will be evaluated through a set of key open questions: 

• What will the infrastructure look like? 
• How will they be resupplied? 
• What will be their primary functions? 
• How will In Situ Resources be integrated? 
• How do we support psychological needs of crews? 
• What lessons learned from space architecture can be applied on Earth?