A 4 billion-year-old meteorite turned into bricks

Using 4.5-billion-year-old meteorite dust, European Space Agency researchers made a brick similar to a Lego toy piece with a 3D printer to investigate a new method for building structures on the Moon and Mars. According to Interesting Engineering, European Space Agency researchers ( ESA) have designed pads and shelters for astronauts in the Artemis program, inspired by Lego toy bricks. To investigate the feasibility of using these space materials for construction, researchers made bricks using meteorite dust with a 3D printer, which are very similar to Lego toy blocks. The purpose of this testing process is the possibility of using the mentioned materials to build small structures.

ESA researchers, along with NASA, investigated various 3D printing technologies to evaluate the fabrication of parts using materials on the Moon or Mars. Although stereolithography has been used for small parts and large formats of building construction with 3D printers, brick making has not been tested so far.

Although making bricks with a mixture of dust in the polymer matrix is ​​not a new process, it is expected that the upcoming tests on the bricks will provide a valuable perspective of their stability and durability in harsh space conditions.

Although the real structures on the moon are gradually being built with materials available in the place, the main challenge is whether space materials can be used to build structures in space or not.

The primary material on the Moon is regolith, which, although there is a sample of it on Earth, is very limited and was sent to Earth by the Apollo missions.

Therefore, the researchers used meteorites, which are a similar space material. They reduced the meteorite to dust and mixed it with a small amount of polylactide and regolith to print 3D bricks similar to Lego blocks. The meteorite used in this process is about 4.5 billion years old and was discovered in northwest Africa in 2000.

This meteorite contains various elements including metal grains and others.