Lunar Surface Science Workshop 2020 (LPI Contrib. No. 2241) 5024.pdf

CREW-TENDED BIOMINING RESEARCH ON THE LUNAR SURFACE. Luis Zea1, Tadg Forward1, Anna H. Kaksonen2, Yosephine Gumulya2, Allison P. Anderson3, and James Crowell4. 1BioServe Space Technologies, University of Colorado, Boulder (3775 Discovery Drive, Boulder, CO 80309, [email protected]), 2Biotechnology and Synthetic Biology Group, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Floreat, Australia, 3Aerospace Engineering Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 4Crow Industries, Inc., Tempe, AZ

Introduction: On Earth, microbes are commonly the activated inoculum will be introduced autonomously used on operations for the extraction of specific via a pump. The bacterium selected for the work elements from , including , , nickel, (Shewanella oneidensis) uses ferric present in the cobalt and , and biooxidising refractory lunar regolith for respiration, which in turn reduces it to ores before cyanidation [1]. In principle, some of these ferrous iron making it easily separable. The bioreactor’s processes may be adaptable to in-situ resource output can be conceptualized as ‘iron-poor’ regolith and utilization (ISRU) in space, including on the lunar and ‘iron-rich’ leach liquor. Samples of this ‘iron-rich’ Martian surfaces [2]. liquor will be brought back to Earth for analysis in line Science Opportunity: Through Commercial Lunar with a long-term vision of developing optimized Payloads Services (CLPS) landers, the opportunity biological systems for ISRU on the Moon and arises to assess the feasibility of biomining processes on eventually, Mars. the lunar surface. Furthermore, and given the Requirements on Artemis Architecture: complexity of certain steps of this process, the presence • Mass: 3 kg of a human crew could (i) increase the probability of • Power: average 15 W mission success, and (ii) help maximize the amount of • Cost: TBD processed metals collected from a given experiment. • Volume: 1.6 x10-3 m3 Concept of Operations: Our experiment will • Crew time: 0.5 hours EVA, 1 hour IVA consist of a bioreactor that will have two inputs: (i) lunar • Landing site: none regolith filtered to be within a specific range of particle Acknowledgments: Preliminary work on the sizes, and (ii) an initial bacterial culture (inoculum). characterization of Shewanella oneidensis’ ability to Regolith can be fed into a leaching vessel either extract iron from lunar, Martian, and asteroid regolith robotically or by a human crew. Doing so robotically simulant from the University of Colorado, Boulder’s would be a complex engineering task, given that the Research Innovation Office to LZ. Preliminary work on mineral particles would need to be collected (e.g. bacterial growth dynamics and associated gene robotic arm extending from Lander) and sieved, while a expression to LZ from National Aeronautics and Space crew could do this easily by using a spoon to pick up Administration Grant No. 80NSSC18K1468. lunar dust, and passing it through a mesh into a References: [1] Coker, J. A. Extremophiles and receiving bucket. Our experiment requires 80 cm3 (<5 biotechnology: current uses and prospects. in3) of regolith. The inoculum will be activated in situ F1000Research 5, 396 (2016). [2] Lehner, B. (2019). To by resuspending a lyophilized (freeze-dried) bacterial new frontiers, Microbiology for nanotechnology and culture in growth medium that has a suitable carbon and space exploration (Doctoral dissertation, Delft electron source for the bacteria. We are currently University of Technology). [3] Zea, L., Niederwieser, implementing this approach on our experiment going T., Stodieck, L,. Carr, C., Moeller, R., Nislow, C., around the Moon on the Artemis 1 mission [3]. The Experiment Design for a Genome-Wide Yeast Fitness experimental hardware will be based on BioServe’s Profiling Experiment On Board Orion’s Artemis 1 Fluid Processing Apparatus (FPA) and Group Mission, IAC-19-A2.7.9x51501, 70th International Activation Pack (GAP) [4]. To date, over 5,000 FPAs Astronautical Congress, Washington, D.C. [4] Zea L, and 600 GAPs have been operated on orbit in over 40 Prasad N, Levy SE, Stodieck L, Jones A, Shrestha S, experiments. We are currently using this hardware on Stodieck, L., Klaus, D. (2016) A Molecular Genetic initial ground-based studies to characterize bacterial Basis Explaining Altered Bacterial Behavior in Space. growth dynamics and gene expression under simulated PLoS ONE 11(11): e0164359. [5] Forward, T., Allen, lunar and Martian gravities [5]. L., Stodieck, L., Klaus, D., Zea, L., Growth Dynamics After the regolith has been introduced, the of Bacteria Under Simulated Lunar and Martian bioreactor will be sealed and warmed/cooled to Gravities, IAC-19-A1.8.2x51510, 70th International maintain an average temperature of 30°C. At this point, Astronautical Congress, Washington, D.C.