When we talk about inhabiting Mars, our attention first goes to the journey. How will we get there? Then we think about survival. What will we eat and how will we breathe?
What is much less talked about is – where will we live?
But that an important question too, for it’s not like you can set up a tent on Mars. Inventors have been thinking about this and they have come up with a solution – 3D printed houses on other planets!
Icon3d, a Texas-based 3D printing company, has recently been granted a patent for automated construction of extraterrestrial houses. It sounds like something straight out of a sci-fi movie, but looking I gave a look at their patent and they do seem have made a compelling case.
So, how do they plan to do it?
Their idea is to use local materials from the planet itself to construct the house.
Their automated printer would collect dust from the planet’s surface and process it to create a fine powder. Then it will use a laser beam to heat and harden the powder into a solid mass. The process is called sintering and is used widely in the 3d printing industry.
You can take a look at the patent here.
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