Blast off! 3D printing is the next giant leap in space exploration

Printing spare parts, buildings, and even medicines could make putting humans in space more sustainable.

Blasting stuff into orbit is expensive. Even with SpaceX's Super Heavy Starship and booster, touted as being 100 times cheaper than current alternatives, you're still looking at up to $600 per kilogram.

This makes it highly expensive to carry out resupply missions to space stations and other off-world bases, or to create space infrastructure – not to mention potentially building human settlements off Earth.

As a result, there's now a concerted effort to advance the use of 3D printing in space, potentially leading to manufacturing platforms in orbit, on the moon, or even on Mars.

There's also the question of sustainability, with the European Space Agency (ESA) saying it hopes one day to recycle materials in orbit to better use resources – for example, by transforming parts from old satellites into new tools or parts.

In fact, the International Space Station (ISS) took delivery of its first 3D printer as long ago as 2014. However, the current version only works in a pressurized environment – which is where a new system from the University of Glasgow comes in.

First 3D printing in vacuum

"Additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, is capable of producing remarkably complex materials quickly and at low cost. Putting that technology in space and printing what we need for assembly in orbit would be fantastically useful," says Dr Gilles Bailet, of the University of Glasgow’s James Watt School of Engineering.

“However, what works well here on Earth is often less robust in the vacuum of space, and 3D printing has never been done outside of the pressurized modules of the International Space Station. The filaments in conventional 3D printers often break or jam in microgravity and in vacuum, which is a problem that needs to be solved before they can be reliably used in space."

Bailet's patented technology has been tested during a series of trips on a research airplane known as the “vomit comet.”

Instead of the problematic filaments used in earthbound 3D printers, it uses a granular material designed to work effectively in microgravity and the vacuum of space. The team says it can be drawn reliably from the prototype’s feedstock tank and delivered to the printer’s nozzle faster than any other method.

Creating spare parts in space, though, will often require metal rather than plastic – and work is proceeding apace here too.

3D printed metal

Last autumn, the first ever metal part 3D-printed in space was created on the ISS. The technology, says the team, could revolutionize operations off-Earth by enabling parts and tools to be produced and repaired on demand.

"This ground-breaking accomplishment of 3D printing metal in microgravity is a crucial step to longer-duration space missions," says Andrew Kuh, head of exploration technology at the UK Space Agency.

"Manufacturing components, tools, and spare parts on-demand in space will help overcome logistical challenges of extended missions to the moon and Mars, where rapid re-supply is not an option."

And, in the longer term, some teams are looking at larger-scale applications for 3D printing in space.

"Additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, is capable of producing remarkably complex materials quickly and at low cost. Putting that technology in space and printing what we need for assembly in orbit would be fantastically useful,"

Dr Gilles Bailet.

Printing moon habitats

The European Space Agency (ESA), for example, is considering the possibility of establishing permanent moon bases. This would require using materials already available on the moon for construction, such as moon dust or regolith, and extracting oxygen or metals from them.

Last summer, a team of ESA scientists succeeded in 3D printing Lego bricks from lunar regolith and meteor dust. Meanwhile, a NASA-led project is working on extracting materials from lunar and Martian regolith to manufacture rechargeable batteries.

Biomedical applications

Another potential application of space-based 3D printing is very different – the use of a 'bioprinter' to help deal with the medical needs of astronauts.

Last October, Finnish bioprinting company Brinter sent its Core 3D bioprinter to the ISS for a research project looking at the effects of microgravity on 3D-printed cellular structures. The aim is to improve the management of health emergencies and diseases in space.

"Bioprinting technologies have great potential to support medical treatment also in space and increase the crew’s autonomy on long-term missions," says Tomi Kalpio, Brinter CEO.

"Astronauts could create tissue-like constructs to replace damaged parts of their bodies, for example, to treat skin burns or bone damages, or print personalized drugs that ideally matched to the person."

According to research from DataIntelo, space 3D printing is set to boom: from a $0.5 billion market in 2023, says the firm, it will hit $5.2 billion by 2032, a compound annual growth rate of 30.1%.

Essentially, effective 3D printing is a necessity for any expansion in space exploration – and will become increasingly important as space exploration becomes more commercialized.

"If we could place fabricators in space to build structures on demand, we would be freed from payload restrictions," said Bailet.

"In turn, that could pave the way to creating much more ambitious, less resource-intensive projects, with systems actually optimized for their mission and not for the constraints of rocket launches."