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Description
It is approaching 50 years since the last human walked on another planetary body (Apollo 17, 1972). The launch of the Insight mission to Mars and the Artemis mission’s human return to the moon presents a unique opportunity for human settlement on Mars and the Moon. To ensure a successful human settlement on Mars and Moon at scales beyond the traditional reconnaissance and exploratory missions, we need to address a host of challenges at multiple levels. Some key examples of these challenges are in-situ harvesting of energy, water, and oxygen, as well as a scarcity of material resources for sustainable construction. Hence, novel construction paradigms must be developed by applying the practice commonly known as In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU). Furthermore, the design of structures such as shelters to shield astronauts and materials from the hostile environment on Mars and the Moon require specific considerations including seismic sources like meteorite impacts, low gravity, thin atmospheres, and abrupt surface temperature variations. We must select a different strategy and carefully consider each of the aforementioned factors in the design and construction. In the literature, a variety of conceptual structures for the lunar and Martian surfaces have been proposed, including deployable, 3D-printed, and generic structures. Additionally, it has recently become a popular idea to use the lunar or Martian lava tubes as a shelter.
In this paper, the dynamic behavior of various regolith shelters on the Martian semi-circular structure is studied. We have simulated a number of models under synthetic Marsquake signals in order to evaluate the key characteristics of the seismic response of various covering systems. The numerical program SiteQuake (Finite Element (FE)/Boundary Element (BE)) is used for this purpose. We look into the primary structure's spectrum amplification under vertical in-plane signals. The extraterrestrial structures and their shield systems are simulated using the FE, while the bedrock and half-space conditions are simulated using the BE, which assures that there are no reflecting waves from the boundaries. One-tenth of the wavelength is chosen as the mesh size for the elements. The seismic signals are imposed as displacement time histories in the BEM section. The results show the intricate nature and complex dynamic interaction of the structure and covering systems due to the scattering of waves in different parts of the structure’s body. Our findings imply that the coupling of these Martian structures and their covering systems must be considered simultaneously in the design in order to accurately reflect the seismic interaction between them. These preliminary findings are based on a conceptual design. Detailed models are required for real-world scenarios.
