Internship: Microgravity Irrigation Design

Internship: Microgravity Irrigation Design

Background

Growing plants in space, on the Moon or Mars is a crucial capability for long term and (semi-) permanent space missions. Plants provide food, useful resources such as fibres and oxygen, and are shown to have a positive psychological impact on astronauts. Being able to grow plants at scale in the hostile space environment is still some time away but at the NLR we are researching how to make space-farming possible.

One of the key challenges the NLR is tackling is a lack of understanding of the growth behaviour of plants in a microgravity and radiation heavy environment. Although plants have been grown on space stations, this has not yielded sufficient data to draw conclusions from on those topics. Because of this, the NLR is working on a small and cost-effective satellite mission to, autonomously, grow plants in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and build up a knowledge position on space farming related technologies.

This internship focusses on one of the key technologies: the hydroponics system, designed to provide a steady supply of water and nutrients to the plant.

Assignment

The assignment consists of the designing, prototyping, and testing of a hydroponics system capable of supplying a plant with water and nutrients in microgravity. This hydroponics system consists, at least, of the following components: a water reservoir, a growth bed, a system to transport water from the reservoir to the growth bed, and a way to measure water consumption. The design must fit in the provided volume and be flexible to handle a number of plants with different consumption rates and growth behaviours. Testing of the prototype will involve germinating plants and/or readily grown plants using your design. The project is expected to contain the following tasks:

• Literature study on existing microgravity hydroponics;
• Initial design;
• Prototyping,
• Test design & testing,
• Design iteration,
• Testing,
• (FEM) simulation of behaviour in microgravity,
• Reporting.

Result

The expected result of the internship project consists of the following deliverables:

• Project plan,
• Mid-term presentation,
• Final presentation,
• Final research report,
• Design prototype.

Duration

The project is expected to take about 5 to 6 months.

Profile

You:

• Are an engineering student (doing your Master or final year of Bachelor),
• Understand how to translate critical elements of a design into a functional prototype,
• Have affinity with plants,
• Have, at least, a basic understanding of the space environment,
• Are creative and come up with your own ideas,
• Are, to some degree, experienced with FEM,
• Are assertive and self-motivated, capable of being part of the project team and also proceed individually.

What we offer

• A challenging internship project in a high-tech result orientated work environment,
• A chance to closely work together with multiple (space) disciplines,
• Being part of the Space Farming project team,
• Weekly supervision and availability of the technical staff for support,
• An internship allowance,
• Working in an actual R&D project as part of the team,
• Learn from the NLR experience and get a better understanding of working at a company such as NLR,
• Social activities outside office hours (e.g. table tennis, pool & billiards, running, bouldering),
• Results to be used in the current and future projects.

About NLR

Royal NLR has been the ambitious research organisation innovating aerospace applications for over 100 years. With that goal, the world of transportation will be safer, more sustainable, more efficient and more effective. Royal NLR is on the threshold of breakthrough innovations. Over 800 driven professionals work on research and innovation, from aircraft engineers to psychologists and from mathematicians to application experts. By combining these various backgrounds and knowledge, Royal NLR has a unique position to develop novel ideas into next generation solutions.

This assignment will be mainly managed by the Space Infrastructure group within the Aerospace Systems Intel and Space Capabilities (ASIS) department.

Contact

Do you have questions before applying? Send them to Rick Meesen (Systems Engineer) via rick.meesen@nlr.nl or to Arno den Toom (Project Manager) via arno.den.toom@nlr.nl!