Madhu Thangavelu

University of Southern California | USC · School of Engineering Dept. of Astronautical Engineering & School of Architecture

View Video Presentation: https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2022-4365.vid In the 2021 Fall term, the ASTE Studio focused creative efforts on how commercial human spaceflight in the United States could catalyze space activity around the globe and steer the future of human spaceflight. With an eye on NASA’s Gateway and Artemis projects, the CHASE project cast...

Helios-Lune Tranquillitas (HLT) is a proposal for a commercial-government partnership Artemis III lunar exploration mission to the Mare Tranquillitatis pit crater. HLT has a primary mission objective of obtaining samples to be returned to Earth for analysis from two locations within the crater: the sunlit wall and talus pile. The samples will be co...

As part of the Artemis program, NASA intends to have boots back on the moon by 2024, with help from the Gateway station in Lunar orbit. The BuzzCraft concept architecture is an alternative to the current lunar Gateway station proposal and the NASA Artemis reference mission to the lunar south polar region. The BuzzCraft concept architecture proposes...

In the 2021 Fall term, the ASTE Studio focused creative efforts on how commercial human spaceflight in the United States could catalyze space activity around the globe and steer the future of human spaceflight. With an eye on NASA's Gateway and Artemis projects, the CHASE project cast the net wide, to seek out synergies and collaborations sans poli...

The concept architecture presented in this paper is about Creating Human Experience through Food (CHEF) in Space. It is part of promoting Commercial Human Spaceflight Expeditions (CHASE), a USC Fall 2021 team project. The overall plan proposes the early transition of the International Space Station (ISS) operations away from NASA core human spacefl...

Alternative Mission Rationales and Profiles for Lunar Gateway and Artemis

A fresh food attachment concept for the International Space Station as the orbital facility prepares to welcome private astronaut activity

Alternative Artemis lll Mission to Mare Tranquillitas to bring back solar activity Records preserved on the Moon

A reliable and sturdy Earth-Moon logistics channel is vital for establishing permanent lunar presence. Assured crew return capability must be part of any lunar mission, including Artemis. BuzzCraft architecture proposes a cislunar cycler architecture to support NASA's Artemis mission to return people to the Moon.

Commemorating UN declared and Moon Village Association supported International Moon Day

The goal of CHEF is to serve freshly prepared gourmet food that provides space travelers with an exceptional dining experience employing robotic technologies, commencing operations at the International Space Station as ISS begins commercial service for space tourists. It addresses the challenges of creating a more palatable meal, providing nutritio...

As part of the Artemis program, NASA intends to have boots back on the moon by 2024, with help from the Gateway station in Lunar orbit. However, questions persist about the physiological consequences of prolonged exposure to deep space radiation on the crew, especially during the upcoming sunspot cycle 25 solar maximum period that will peak during...

Helios Lune Tranquillitas (HLT) is a commercial-government partnership Artemis III lunar exploration mission to the Mare Tranquillitatis pit crater. Lave Tube exploration and careful extraction and collection of pristine lunar regolith samples to study solar activity over geological time is a goal of this mission. Study underway.

View Video Presentation: https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2021-4112.vid Much of the planetary defense literature to date is focused on mitigating direct threats to planet Earth. Few studies have included the threat to Earth posed by an impactor on our Moon. Since the Moon is in close orbit around our planet, an impact on the Moon, particularly at certain...

This 2020 USC TWINS project, following the 2018 ADAM Project and the 2019 MAXIM, continues to weave a narrative that wishes humanity to return to the Moon at the earliest, to retire the known risks, gain the vital experience needed to push on to Mars and settle other worlds. Hard data is what good engineers depend on to build and evolve reliable sy...

www.PosterPresentations.com • Proposed target location: Mare Tranquillitatis • Avoid steep, sloped, treacherous skylight entry by using a lander/rover pair as anchors on either side of the skylight opening. • The rover drives carrying a cable attached the cargo lander around the lip of the skylight and then pull it taut once in position. • A small...

SLSP is being proposed as a Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) Technology Demo mission to help achieve these three goals. However, the Moon is a harsh and unforgiving environment, providing several challenges that need to be overcome in order to develop our lunar infrastructure. First is the constraint of delivering all materials we need on t...

NASA’s Artemis program has the ambitious goals of putting a woman and man on the Moon by 2024 and establishing a sustainable lunar presence. The Moon’s unwelcoming nature, extreme and harsh surface conditions make clear that robotics will be an integral part of any mission; especially those with sustainability in mind. Diurnal temperatures on the l...

Past, Present and Future Imaginations, Concepts and Proposals for speedy expeditions and eventual settlement ? of Mars.

Economically viable and reliable building systems and tool sets are being sought, examined and tested for extraterrestrial infrastructure buildup. This project utilizes a unique architecture weaving the robotic building construction technology with designs for assisting rapid buildup of initial operational capability Lunar and Martian bases. The pr...

Just as the space community is expanding our presence into the solar system and beyond, a group of thought leaders, including visionary policy makers, architects, engineers and allied professionals are peering into the Earth, studying co-relations of various dynamic systems including land, air and sea agents, and finding new ways to report and appl...

Slides of the paper presented at the AIAA ASCEND Online Conference on November 16th, 2020.

Space & City:Outer Space Activities and City Evolution Poster of the paper presented at the AIAA ASCEND Online Conference Nov 16-18, 2020

Following the 2018 USC ADAM project that was presented at the 2019 IAC in Washington DC., the 2019 USC ARTEMIS Maximum Impact Moon(MAXIM) Mission Project chose to pay tribute to a unique group of high-achieving engineers and scientists and astronaut explorers who created and executed the Apollo program with such daring and precision. They went on t...

The current US administration has laid out a series of Space Policy Directives intended to reaffirm American preeminence in space in general and human space activity in particular. The directives provide a clear mandate to NASA to quickly return humans to the Moon with the clear intent to gain vital know-how to execute a long duration, endurance-cl...

The Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) habitat is a lunar and Martian analog research station located on the active volcano Mauna Loa in Hawaii. Missions that take place at HI-SEAS are open to space agencies, organizations and companies worldwide to take part in, provided their research and technology testing will help contrib...

The Moon is our closest celestial neighbor. Half a century ago, people made repeated visits there. Current technologies promise to bring cislunar travel to the masses for a fraction of the resources employed during the Apollo era. Private companies have been eyeing lunar tourism and some are making real progress toward providing that service. Some...

Studies from the 2019 Spring USC Graduate Architecture seminar will show how our cosmopolitan cities, urban and suburban landscapes and dwellings are already using space assets including crew on orbiting space stations and allied technologies to monitor, inform and enhance quality of life. Orbiting spacecraft also help predict, alert and even preve...

The Moon, our Moon, is not just an object of scientific curiosity. Our closest celestial neighbor holds tremendous value to our civilization and cultures, and each and every one these values transcend what science and technology portray our Moon to be; a dormant and lifeless celestial body that projects a "magnificent desolation". While our Moon ho...

Lead an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities. Beginning with missions beyond low-Earth orbit, the United States will lead the return of humans to the Moon for long-term exploration and...

RETURN TO THE MOON 2024: RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE 2018 USC ADVANCED DEVELOPMENT ARCHITECTURES FOR THE MOON(ADAM) PROJECT FOR QUICK AND SUSTAINABLE LUNAR ACTIVITIES

The US administration has laid out, in the clearest terms yet in many years, what the nation expects NASA to do in the immediate term: Return people to the Moon asap(2020s timeframe) with the goal of building the technological and operational infrastructure to conduct a safe human Mars expedition within next two decades(2030s). What projects can w...

Space activity and allied technologies are finding their way into Smart City evolution. Future City evolution challenges may be mitigated by solutions and technologies already employed successfully by space mission designers and managers.

Planetary Defense (PD) entails the technical means for mitigating asteroid impact threat and building a viable political framework to arrive at a reliable state of readiness to defend Earth from extraterrestrial impactors. This is an advocacy paper combining pragmatic arguments based on current, effective and reliable technologies. Short and long-t...

Prior to human arrival to the Moon or Mars, some infrastructure will be required to ensure success of the goals of the mission. Such infrastructure may include landing pads, dust mitigation surfaces, thermal wadis, and shelter/habitats. To reduce the mass of construction materials to be transported from Earth, it will be critical to utilize in situ...

www.PosterPresentations.com • Fabrication of the newly designed tile using sintering. • Testing and analysis of new design for impact loads, thermal loads. • Developing novel 3D interlocking tessellations and tile cladding models for different construction design architectures.

Case for the Economic and Cultural Development of our Moon, presented at the National Space Society International Space Development Conference, Los Angeles, May 2018

The logical case for siting permanent habitats inside Lunar Lava Tubes, preaented at the 2018 National Space Society International Space Development Conference in Los Angeles, California

In order to map and catalogue the size and locations of lunar lava tubes, this proposal calls for a two-phase dedicated discovery class mission to search for and survey lava tubes and subsurface caverns, while also prospecting for water ice and volatile deposits. Similar technology can be used to search for both lava tubes and volatiles. The first...

The proposed MPIT method is to adapt well established Earth construction machines like the slab cutter and cone crusher to work in the lunar vacuum and low gravity environment. By adapting a cone crusher to create different sizes of aggregate, the machine would then need to have a system to trap the high energy debris. The debris trapping system wo...

To execute successful extraterrestrial missions farther out in space, it is prudent to test, evolve and master useful technologies in extraterrestrial environments that are close to Earth. A high-fidelity simulated settlement on our Moon would be the perfect proximal extraterrestrial location to test and certify new technologies for more ambitious...

In the effort to establish a settlement on Mars, Phobos, a moon of Mars, has been proposed as a way point to set up an exploration base as well as a teleoperations platform to explore and select promising locations, and eventually establish a settlement on the surface of Mars. However, the cost to establish a base on Phobos may be similar in time a...

Solar particle radiation and galactic cosmic radiation pose a direct threat to crew safety on extended lunar and interplanetary missions. A few meters of rock are sufficient to reduce background radiation to a safe level. Rather than bringing heavy shielding material from Earth, or excavating material from the Moon’s surface to cover habitats, the...

It is well known that if you have a good idea and a clear, appealing narrative, it is much easier to engineer such a concept. On the other hand, if the narrative is created "by committee" for reasons that have to do more with socioeconomic policies bundled with various other constituency demands, a concept becomes unwieldy, obfuscated and often ver...

Economically viable and reliable building systems and tool sets are being sought, examined and tested for extraterrestrial infrastructure buildup. This project utilizes a unique architecture weaving the robotic building construction technology with designs for assisting rapid buildup of initial operational capability Lunar and Martian bases. The pr...

Samples retrieved from deep space, e.g.,asteroid or comet, by virtue of trajectories and energies required to bring them back to Earth, can take many months to years. During that period, changes can occur to those samples. Curation procedures are sought that can preserve the sample in as pristine a condition as possible. Some ideas and recommendati...

Future In Space Operations Talk, November 16, 2016

The Moon, our closest celestial neighbor, was visited by astronauts nearly half a century ago, and a new wave of robotic missions are mapping it in extraordinary detail. Many nations and even private entities are in advanced stages of robotic lunar missions, deploying orbiters and landers to utilize, evolve and refine advanced space technologies an...

Advances in technology since original paper in 1988 allow speedy deployment of MALEO Moon base,

How human space settlement technology can impact the quality of life of life of the people on Earth.

Surface activities of the first Mars mission crew, as suggested in phase I of the NASA HEDS reference mission, are discussed in this paper. The HEDS reference mission calls for a two phased approach. In phase I, humans supported by robotic systems will explore the Martian surface, collect and analyze geologic, geophysical, and meteorological data,...

This poster is an advocacy document. We believe that it is now time for an international coalition of military/industrial/atomic agencies to take on the tasks of designing, building and maintaining in readiness active defenses against asteroids and comets threatening to impact Earth. We visualize a policy environment where a relatively small portio...

Space debris & micrometeor impacts pose a significant threat to the ISS, as evident by the continuous barrage of damage sustained throughout its operation. Though critical systems have not yet been affected, active monitoring, damage assessment, repair and recovery options are high priority items in ISS operations. Solar arrays are especially vulne...

Planetary Defense is a complex problem, not well understood by policy makers and the general public. The recent Chelyabinsk incident in Russia created temporary international attention but has failed to effectively stimulate public action. The lack of long-term attention to cosmic hazards has resulted in limited funding to defend our planet. Hence,...

Asteroids and other extraterrestrial impactor threats to Earth occur naturally in our solar system. Larger, more massive bodies including cometary fragments in high energy trajectories will be able to pierce the Earth’s atmosphere and cause cataclysmic destruction if they are not stopped well enough in advance. Modern Directed Energy Systems are an...

The International Space University(ISU) Space Studies Program(SSP) will hold its 28th summer session at the Ohio University, Athens, Ohio between June 08 and August 07, 2015. Over a hundred highly qualified graduate and post graduate students as well as young space professionals in leadership roles selected from a large pool of candidates from vari...

Overview of international NEO education and outreach activities.

Ceaseless demographic growth and the depletion of the Earth's natural resources make the colonisation of space an increasingly compelling prospect. Madhu Thangavelu, an expert in the design of complex space projects, including space stations and exploratory missions, and a professor in the Department of Astronautical Engineering at the University o...

Several unique systems including the Lunar Electric Rover, the unpressurized Chariot rover, the versatile light-weight crane and Athlete cargo transporter as well as the habitat module mockups and a new generation of spacesuits are undergoing coordinated tests at NASA's facility for Desert Research and Test Studies (D-RATS). A synergetic simulation...

Throughout history, asteroids have been a constant threat to the global way of life. There have been a series of events ranging from close-calls to actual Earth impacts, and still, few actually pay any attention to this phenomena. Recent occurrences have not only brought this possible catastrophe to light, but have garnered political notice. The Gl...

A concept for a long term natural radiation belt remediation method is presented. Manned and unmanned spacecraft in near Earth orbits must account for operating in the Van Allen radiation belts, a region of space where large concentrations of high energy charged particles are trapped along the Earth's magnetic field lines. To counter-act the effect...

Humans have long dreamt of exploring and settling the Moon. The visions of human space activity stemming from the first half of the twentieth century culminated in the Apollo program landing two astronauts on the Moon in 1969, and until 1972, 12 astronauts had walked the Moon and performed scientific experiments. In the new millennium, several nati...

In order to broaden the horizon of manned space exploration and other energy-intensive activities well beyond the Earth and the Sun’s immediate sphere of influence, nuclear energy is the only viable option at the present time. One of the policy roadblocks for operating high-energy nuclear power systems in space is the inherent risk of launcher fail...

A concept for a commercial interplanetary cruise ship called "Cosmic Mariner" is presented. An initial configuration for the vehicle is described, which includes assembly at the International Space Station (ISS) using existing crew, tools and the vast ISS buildup experience heritage. The proposed configuration consists of relatively few elements, s...

While the current Deep Space Network (DSN) has been used successfully for numerous space missions in the past for telemetry, communication and control and for signal and data processing, the rapidly increasing number of mission support and bandwidth overload have become an emerging problem, and alleviating this bottle-neck has become a priority. To...

A lunar base development strategy that simultaneously employs robots and humans in a safe, effective and economic manner is depicted in this USC School of Architecture and School of Engineering design project done in the Spring of 2012, under the banner of the graduate Moon Studio. Real time telerobotic systems are proposed as an economically viabl...

Contour Crafting is a digitally controlled construction process invented by Professor Behrokh Khoshnevis that fabricates components directly from computer models, using layered fabrication technology. By obviating the need for formwork used in traditional concrete construction, CC can reduce costs and construction times significantly. The technique...

Bio-regenerative Life Support Systems (BLSS) uses biological processes to support an astronaut crew, and includes atmosphere revitalization, water recycling, food production, and organic waste recycling. The University of Arizona Controlled Environment Agriculture Center (UA-CEAC), Systems and Industrial Engineering Department, Sadler Machine Co. (...

Several unique systems including the Lunar Electric Rover, the unpressurized Chariot rover, the versatile light-weight crane and Athlete cargo transporter as well as the habitat module mockups and a new generation of spacesuits are undergoing coordinated tests at NASA's facility for Desert Research and Test Studies (D-RATS). A synergetic plan is pr...

Humans have long dreamt of exploring and settling the Moon. The visions of human space activity stemming from the first half of the 20th century culminated in the Apollo program landing two astronauts on the Moon in 1969, and until 1972, 12 astronauts had walked the Moon and performed scientific experiments. In the new millennium, several nations h...

Among the many aspects of environmental control in a lunar habitat is that of regulating the atmospheric chemical composition. After meeting acceptable standards of safety, health and personal acceptance for long stays, the question arises as to how the atmosphere could be made an aestheti