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3D printing in space could even produce new rocket engines
Space travelers in the near future could produce a wide variety of items on 3D printers, from replacement parts to entire new engines to replace broken rockets.
The National Research Council (NRC) released a report exploring the possible uses for 3D printers, or additive manufacturing, during future space missions. The council noted that although potential benefits from using 3D printers in space appear possible, today's technology prevents the devices from having a major impact in the short term.
Some of the challenges to manufacturing in space mentioned in the report include microgravity, the vacuum of space and rapidly changing temperatures. Each of these factors, alone or in conjunction, can wreak havoc with current 3D printers.
An astronaut or autonomous robonaut will need to also need to watch over the machines, adding cost to the process, and removing a worker from other projects.
Human space missions could make use of 3D printing to create just what they need, when they need it. This could save weight (and cost) over bringing backups of everything.
"The benefits of in-space additive manufacturing for robotic spacecraft are far less clear, although this rapidly advancing technology can also potentially enable space-based construction of large structures and, perhaps someday, substantially in the future, entire spacecraft," the Committee on Space-Based Additive Manufacturing and others wrote in the report announcing the study.
Additive manufacturing in space will, in the coming decades, need to be conducted in orbiting outposts independent of the International Space Station. The study looked forward to the years and decades after the retirement of the ISS, and how that could affect the technology.
The aerospace industry is known for producing unique, complex systems in extremely limited quantities. Those requirements are ideal for 3D printers, and manufacturers are making widespread use of the devices. However, these machines are mostly ground-based so far. Some challenges for space-based manufacturing include a cost comparison between launching ready-made goods, or the materials to print them. Also, goods manufactured in space cannot be tested in facilities on the ground.
The report was funded by NASA and the Air Force. Recommendations include facilitating communications both inside and outside the agency. The agency should then work to create a plan to modernize technology for additive manufacturing. A series of experiments should be planned, the report stated, testing new 3D printing technologies aboard the International Space Station. Hiring of additional people skilled in additive manufacturing was also recommended.
NASA has already conducted its own studies of how 3D printers operate in space, and even investigated printing food for astronauts.
Source: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/10844/20140720/3d-printing-space-rocket-engines.htm
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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