Lorne Malvo
Biden 2020
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The current U.S. space suit used by NASA is a dinosaur. Designed in 1992, it was only ever intended to be used by crews aboard the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS). That may have been good enough in the days of 14 kps modems, but with eyes turning increasingly toward missions to the Moon, Mars and the asteroids, space explorers need something better. That’s why NASA is designing its first new suit in twenty years. Developed by NASA’s Advanced Exploration Systems (AES), the Z-1 prototype space suit currently undergoing vacuum testing at the Johnson Space Center is a wearable laboratory of new technology. And it’s a hatchback.
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The backpack also shows what two decades of new technology can bring. It’s more robust and less vulnerable to contamination than the current model and has more capabilities. For example, the current backpack uses a sublimator to cool the suit, but that only works in a hard vacuum. NASA wanted one that would work on Mars, so the Z-1 uses a water membrane evaporation cooler that cools using the same principle as sweating and it’s tough enough to survive freezing.
Another improvement are the scrubbers to remove carbon dioxide. The current ones use lithium hydroxide/metal oxide carbon dioxide scrubbers, which need to be baked between missions to drive off the carbon dioxide. The new ones regenerate automatically by dumping the carbon dioxide every few minutes.
Lessons learned from Z-1 will be used to develop Z-2, the next-generation prototype. NASA hopes to have a new vacuum-compatible suit by 2015.
NASA's first new spacesuit in 20 years is its own airlock
