The four ton Digital Construction Platform (DCP) is solar-powered and features a large robotic arm for reach and a smaller arm for dexterity. The design is based upon an Altec aerial-lift system, much like the bucket lifts commonly used by workers on electrical power lines. In this case, the bucket has been replaced by a robotic arm.

Different tools can be attached to the smaller arm, such as a grinder or welding system or a nozzle that can mix and spray viscous building materials such as mud, foam, or concrete. The DCP is fitted out with special sensors to gauge site metrics ranging from radiation to topography. It sits atop tank treads for easy mobility on all types of building sites.

Steven Keating, of MIT’s Mediated Matter Group, took inspiration from trees, which grow on their own volition using readily available local resources such as sunlight energy and soil. A tree structure is efficient, its trunk tapers towards the sky, supported by strong outer rings which allow for a less dense core. It adapts to local conditions.

“With this process, we can replace one of the key parts of making a building, right now. It could be integrated into a building site tomorrow,” said Steven Keating, co-author of a paper published in the journal “Science Robotics.”

The system can be deployed anywhere and takes minutes to set up. It can operate for eight hours on one charge, longer if connected to diesel backup motors.  DCP can fold up small enough to drive through a set of standard double doors.

The project, which began in 2011, has evolved to a point where it can create objects ia all sizes. DCP recently completed a dome-like structure (see lead image) that measures 50 feet in diameter and 12 feet tall.  It was built in 13.5 hours using a stock insultating foam spray.  While this is not exactly a “house”, the dome can serve as a mold for poured-in concrete or mud that would provide structural heft. If you are looking into remodelling your house, here’s a guide for traditional homes. Compare that with mud building or doing it yourself!

“This one technique allows us to get our foot in the door on a construction site,” Keating told FastCoDesign. But his long-term vision is to deploy the system in the developing world or in disaster areas, for example after a major earthquake, to provide quick shelter.  The team sees this happening within the next 10 years. Their ultimate aim is to work in remote places such as Antarctica, the moon and Mars to make buildings out of local materials such as ice or moon dust. Keating said technology like this could be ready in 50 years or sooner.

The lab isn’t writing off corporate opportunities, but it did put all of its hardware specs and digital software online for anyone to freely take and use, or expand upon. “We’ve shown how we could do [it],” Keating told CNNTech, “and NASA is very excited to use ice for printing on Mars because ice absorbs a lot of cosmic radiation.”

There is also potential to feed the DCP organic building materials, such as animal proteins and photosynthetic E. coli, to print living buildings. Mediated Matter Group has already synthesized living plastics from squid and cuttlefish. Combining robotic construction with evolving materials that can change color in the presence of carbon dioxide, or self-diagnose and repair cracks points to a future where buildings adapt to their environments and grow to nurture themselves and their cohabitants, just like trees do.

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Israeli design team Tridom won honorable mention in NASA’s 3D Printed Habitat Challenge for their ‘Bubble Base’ building, a prototype for future human habitation on Mars. The design competition invited solutions to the “need for safe, secure and sustainable housing on earth and beyond.”  This goes beyond Hollywood set design for The Martian (shown above) or Interstellar. It’s also grounded in rapidly emerging technologies, with immediate application.

Tridom team leaders Yaron Schwarcz and Lior Aharoni, assisted by Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design architecture graduate Helen Wexler, presented a design of a flexible structure that is inflated with a small amount of liquefied natural gas once. A swarm of construction drones would cast quartz-rich, Martian sand into building blocks that would anchor the domed structure around it’s base. (See image of ‘Bubble Base’ below.) Almost all of the design teams used robots or drones for their building assembly process.

Designers had to address environmental concerns specific to Mars, such as radiation exposure and extremely high temperatures, while including fairly standard residential elements such as gardens, communal and private spaces, and a gym.

Specialists in construction robotics, Tridom has extensively researched 3D-printed sustainable housing. They are currently developing a frameless 3D printer which extrudes recycled building cement through a robotic arm, reducing labor costs and construction waste.

Shelter is one of our most basic and crucial needs, but packing materials and equipment to construct housing on a distant planet would take up valuable cargo space that could be used for other life-sustaining provisions. Ideally, habitat would be constructed from indigenous materials, combined with recycled waste – which reduces transport impacts whether the project is terrestrial or in outer space. Adding 3D manufacturing to the mix allows added flexibility, as bespoke elements of the building can be manufactured on site. 

“The future possibilities for 3-D printing are inspiring, and the technology is extremely important to deep space exploration,” said Sam Ortega, NASA program manager. “This challenge definitely raises the bar from what we are currently capable of, and we are excited to see what the maker community does with it.”

The NASA challenge, in cooperation with the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute (America’s 3D Printing Institute) is a $2.25 million competition to design and build a 3D printed habitat for deep space exploration, but – like most NASA research and development – the results will also be applied to sustainable housing solutions and evolving construction technology here on Earth.

Geopolitical instability, climate change, and ballooning global population could make the mass human migration underway from the Middle East to Europe seem like a stroll along the Champs Elysee. Safety and security should be basic human rights, but clean water and adequate food are essential human needs.  The wars that will result when out taps are dry and our cupboards bare will make battles fought over religion and energy pale by comparison. Science is looking to space for solutions.

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