0:00:19.641,0:00:22.270
I must have been about twelve years old

0:00:22.296,0:00:26.126
when my dad took me[br]to an exhibition on space,

0:00:26.166,0:00:28.276
not far from here, in Brussels.

0:00:29.696,0:00:33.663
The year was about - I think it was 1988,[br]so it was the end of the Cold War.

0:00:34.283,0:00:38.049
There was a bit of an upmanship going on[br]between the Americans and the Russians

0:00:38.049,0:00:40.059
bringing bits to that exhibition.

0:00:41.421,0:00:44.311
NASA brought a big blown-up space shuttle,

0:00:44.915,0:00:49.445
but the Russians, they brought[br]a MIR space station.

0:00:49.956,0:00:54.450
It was actually the training module,[br]you could go inside and check it all out.

0:00:54.450,0:00:56.030
It was the real thing,

0:00:56.030,0:00:57.843
where the buttons and the wires were,

0:00:57.843,0:01:00.860
where the astronauts were eating,[br]where they were working.

0:01:01.440,0:01:06.870
And when I came home, first thing I did,[br]I started drawing spaceships.

0:01:08.096,0:01:10.379
These weren't science fiction spaceships.

0:01:10.569,0:01:11.639
No,

0:01:11.639,0:01:13.479
they were actually technical drawings,

0:01:13.479,0:01:19.009
they were cutaway sections[br]of what a structure would be made out of,

0:01:19.009,0:01:21.939
where the wires were,[br]where the screws were.

0:01:22.868,0:01:24.505
So, fortunately,

0:01:24.505,0:01:28.665
I didn't become a space engineer,[br]but I did become an architect.

0:01:29.095,0:01:31.936
So, these are some of the projects[br]I have been involved with

0:01:31.936,0:01:34.596
over the last decade and a half.

0:01:35.226,0:01:38.700
All these projects are quite different,[br]quite different shapes,

0:01:38.700,0:01:41.570
and it is because they are built[br]in different environments

0:01:41.570,0:01:43.510
they have different constraints.

0:01:44.310,0:01:47.833
And I think, design[br]becomes really interesting

0:01:47.833,0:01:52.043
when you get really harsh constraints.

0:01:53.460,0:01:57.631
Now, these projects have been[br]all over the world, right?

0:02:00.233,0:02:04.313
A few years ago, this map[br]wasn't good enough, it was too small.

0:02:06.190,0:02:10.809
We had to add this one[br]because we were going to do

0:02:10.970,0:02:14.270
a project on the Moon[br]for the European Space Agency.

0:02:14.620,0:02:16.930
They asked us to design a Moon habitat,

0:02:17.891,0:02:20.861
and one on Mars with NASA -

0:02:21.105,0:02:25.245
the competition to look at[br]a habitation on Mars.

0:02:28.282,0:02:32.909
Whenever you go[br]to another place as an architect

0:02:33.148,0:02:35.250
and try to design something,

0:02:36.233,0:02:39.503
you look at the local architecture,[br]the precedents that are there.

0:02:39.503,0:02:41.906
On the Moon, that is[br]kind of difficult, of course,

0:02:41.906,0:02:46.276
because there is only this,[br]there is only the Apollo missions.

0:02:47.426,0:02:50.052
The last time we went there,[br]I wasn't even born yet.

0:02:50.411,0:02:53.713
And we only spent about three days there.

0:02:54.614,0:02:58.705
For me, that is kind of a long[br]camping trip, isn't it,

0:02:58.732,0:03:00.532
but a rather expensive one.

0:03:03.835,0:03:04.955
The tricky thing,

0:03:04.955,0:03:07.886
when you are going to build[br]on another planet or on the Moon,

0:03:08.593,0:03:12.133
is how to get it there.

0:03:14.256,0:03:16.736
First of all, to get a kilogram,

0:03:16.736,0:03:18.563
for example, to the Moon surface,

0:03:18.563,0:03:21.425
it will cost about 200,000 dollars.

0:03:22.579,0:03:24.085
Very expensive.

0:03:24.085,0:03:26.364
So, you want to keep it very light.

0:03:27.494,0:03:29.590
Second: space. Space is limited.

0:03:30.310,0:03:32.091
This is the Ariane 5 rocket.

0:03:32.271,0:03:36.618
The space you have there is about[br]four and a half meters by seven meters,

0:03:37.324,0:03:38.676
not that much.

0:03:38.996,0:03:41.962
So, it needs to be an architectural system

0:03:41.962,0:03:46.248
that is both compact,[br]or compactible, and light.

0:03:46.248,0:03:48.962
I think I've got one right here.

0:03:50.392,0:03:54.310
It is very compact and it is very light.

0:03:54.763,0:03:59.967
And actually, this is one I made earlier.

0:04:03.216,0:04:05.001
There's one problem with it,

0:04:05.001,0:04:09.440
that inflatables are quite fragile,

0:04:11.060,0:04:13.000
they need to be protected,

0:04:14.759,0:04:19.161
specifically when you go[br]to a very harsh environment like the Moon.

0:04:21.353,0:04:22.834
Look at it like this.

0:04:24.864,0:04:29.145
The temperature difference on a Moon base[br]could be anything up to 200 degrees.

0:04:29.145,0:04:33.207
On one side of the base[br]it could be a 100 degrees Celsius,

0:04:33.207,0:04:35.906
and on the other side[br]it could be minus 100 degrees.

0:04:36.153,0:04:38.475
You need to protect yourself from that.

0:04:39.535,0:04:43.817
The Moon also does not have[br]any magnetic fields,

0:04:45.197,0:04:47.345
which means that any radiation -

0:04:47.345,0:04:51.240
solar radiation, cosmic radiation -[br]will hit the surface.

0:04:52.036,0:04:54.258
We need to protect ourselves[br]from that as well,

0:04:54.258,0:04:56.498
protect the astronauts from that.

0:04:56.888,0:04:59.832
And then third,[br]but definitely not last,

0:05:00.137,0:05:03.161
the Moon doesn't have any atmosphere,

0:05:03.731,0:05:07.479
which means any meteorites coming into it

0:05:07.479,0:05:09.936
will not get burned up[br]and will hit the surface.

0:05:09.936,0:05:13.009
That's why the Moon is full of craters.

0:05:13.419,0:05:16.265
Again, we need to protect[br]the astronauts from that.

0:05:17.095,0:05:19.507
So what kind of structure do we need?

0:05:19.839,0:05:25.458
The best thing is really a cave,[br]because a cave has a lot of mass.

0:05:25.495,0:05:28.997
And we need mass, we need mass[br]to protect ourselves from temperatures,

0:05:28.997,0:05:32.329
from radiation, and from meteorites.

0:05:35.544,0:05:37.865
So, this is how we solved it.

0:05:38.985,0:05:41.905
We have indeed the blue part,[br]as you can see,

0:05:41.905,0:05:45.268
that is an inflatable for a Moon base.

0:05:45.698,0:05:48.858
It gives a lot of living space[br]and a lot of lab space.

0:05:50.284,0:05:53.028
And attached to it, you have a cylinder,

0:05:54.108,0:05:56.528
and that has all[br]the support structures in it,

0:05:56.764,0:06:00.188
all the life support and also the airlock.

0:06:01.215,0:06:03.460
And on the top of that,[br]we have a structure -

0:06:03.460,0:06:08.419
that domed structure, that protects[br]ourselves, has a lot of mass in it.

0:06:11.929,0:06:13.612
Where do we get this material from?

0:06:13.612,0:06:16.983
Are we going to bring concrete[br]and cement from Earth to the Moon?

0:06:16.983,0:06:21.125
Well, of course not, because it is[br]way too heavy, it's too expensive.

0:06:22.311,0:06:24.933
We are going to use local materials.

0:06:25.353,0:06:27.936
Local materials is something[br]we do on Earth as well.

0:06:27.936,0:06:30.173
Wherever we build,[br]in whatever country we build,

0:06:30.173,0:06:32.682
we always look at:[br]what are the local materials here?

0:06:33.992,0:06:36.911
The problem with the Moon is:[br]what are the local materials?

0:06:36.911,0:06:40.386
Well, there is not that many,[br]we actually have one.

0:06:40.916,0:06:42.405
It is moon dust,

0:06:43.175,0:06:48.111
or, fancy or scientific name,[br]"regolith," Moon regolith.

0:06:49.507,0:06:51.975
Great thing is it is everywhere, right?

0:06:51.975,0:06:54.007
The surface is covered with it -

0:06:54.007,0:06:57.835
there's about 20 centimeters[br]up to a few meters everywhere.

0:06:58.782,0:07:01.164
But how are we going to build with it?

0:07:01.324,0:07:03.824
Well, we are going to use a 3D printer.

0:07:04.504,0:07:07.944
Whenever I ask any of you[br]what a 3D printer is,

0:07:07.944,0:07:11.084
you probably think[br]of something about this size,

0:07:11.592,0:07:16.144
and it would print things[br]that are about this size.

0:07:16.144,0:07:19.186
Of course, we won't bring[br]a massive 3D printer to the Moon

0:07:19.186,0:07:20.835
to print a Moon base.

0:07:20.835,0:07:24.745
I am going to use a much smaller device,[br]something like this one here.

0:07:25.729,0:07:30.483
This is a small device, a small[br]robot rover that has a little scoop,

0:07:31.293,0:07:34.953
and it brings the regolith to the dome,

0:07:35.190,0:07:38.972
and then it lays down[br]a thin layer of regolith.

0:07:39.182,0:07:44.079
And then you will have the robot[br]solidify it layer by layer

0:07:44.929,0:07:49.061
until it creates,[br]after a few months, the full base.

0:07:54.400,0:07:56.037
You might have noticed

0:07:56.037,0:08:00.357
that it is quite a particular[br]structure that we are printing.

0:08:00.357,0:08:04.044
I have got a little example here.

0:08:05.404,0:08:10.114
We call this a closed-cell foam structure.

0:08:10.434,0:08:12.253
Looks quite natural.

0:08:12.533,0:08:16.128
The reason we are using this[br]as a part of that shell structure

0:08:16.435,0:08:20.309
is that we only need[br]to solidify certain parts,

0:08:20.969,0:08:24.041
which means we have to bring[br]less binder from Earth,

0:08:24.041,0:08:26.437
and it becomes much lighter.

0:08:27.967,0:08:30.649
This is really not just,

0:08:30.739,0:08:34.322
let's say, paper architecture, right?

0:08:34.502,0:08:38.645
We wanted to go and test this out,[br]so we went to Italy with this company,

0:08:38.778,0:08:44.534
and we tried out to print[br]a mock-up, the real size.

0:08:45.474,0:08:48.977
We are also using, well, not moon dust,[br]because that would be --

0:08:48.977,0:08:51.917
first of all, there's not a lot[br]of moon dust to do this with.

0:08:51.972,0:08:53.984
We used a moon dust simulant.

0:08:55.144,0:09:00.626
This is dust that has chemically[br]the same consistency as moon dust.

0:09:01.304,0:09:03.613
And we printed it layer by layer.

0:09:05.030,0:09:09.144
But you might notice[br]that the block we printed here

0:09:09.144,0:09:11.185
is about one and a half tons heavy

0:09:11.465,0:09:14.369
and has a much thicker structure[br]than the one I have here.

0:09:14.785,0:09:18.035
Well, this is because this one[br]I designed for the Moon,

0:09:18.035,0:09:22.024
which has one sixth[br]of the gravity of Earth.

0:09:22.284,0:09:26.040
And this one here, of course,[br]is printed on Earth.

0:09:26.040,0:09:28.187
So it is much thicker.

0:09:32.247,0:09:36.749
That approach of designing[br]something and then covering it

0:09:36.749,0:09:40.747
with a protective dome,[br]we also did for our Mars project.

0:09:41.632,0:09:45.180
You see here three domes,[br]and you see the printers

0:09:45.180,0:09:47.787
printing these dome structures.

0:09:49.737,0:09:52.949
Now, there is a big difference[br]between Mars and Moon.

0:09:52.949,0:09:54.371
Let me explain it.

0:09:57.031,0:10:02.700
This diagram shows you, to scale,[br]the size of Earth and the Moon

0:10:02.700,0:10:06.676
and the real distance,[br]about 400 thousand kilometers.

0:10:08.756,0:10:10.050
If we then go to Mars -

0:10:11.160,0:10:14.622
The distance from Mars to Earth,[br]and this picture here is taken

0:10:14.622,0:10:19.209
by the rover on Mars, Curiosity,[br]looking back at Earth.

0:10:19.209,0:10:21.874
You can see the little[br]speckle there - that is the Earth,

0:10:21.874,0:10:24.216
400 million kilometers away.

0:10:25.856,0:10:27.945
The problem with that distance is

0:10:27.945,0:10:31.223
that it is a thousand times the distance[br]Earth-Moon, pretty far away,

0:10:31.700,0:10:35.182
but there is no direct radio contact

0:10:35.182,0:10:38.210
with, for example, the Curiosity rover.

0:10:38.210,0:10:41.937
So I cannot teleoperate it from Earth.

0:10:41.937,0:10:45.789
I can't say, "Mars rover, go left!"

0:10:46.209,0:10:49.606
because that signal will take[br]twenty minutes to get to Mars,

0:10:50.256,0:10:52.623
then the rover might go left,

0:10:53.013,0:10:54.931
and then it will take another 20 minutes

0:10:54.931,0:10:57.257
before it can tell me,[br]"Oh, yeah, I went left."

0:10:59.261,0:11:02.268
So, stuff, rovers and robots

0:11:02.958,0:11:05.223
are going to have to work autonomously.

0:11:06.288,0:11:12.219
The other issue with it is that[br]missions to Mars are highly risky.

0:11:12.687,0:11:15.501
We have only seen it a few weeks ago.

0:11:15.901,0:11:20.247
What if half of the mission[br]doesn't arrive at Mars, what do we do?

0:11:20.838,0:11:25.099
Instead of building just one[br]or two rovers, like we did on the Moon,

0:11:25.209,0:11:27.299
we're going to build hundreds of them.

0:11:28.449,0:11:30.984
It's a bit like a termites mount,

0:11:31.484,0:11:34.769
I would take half of the colony[br]of the termites away,

0:11:34.769,0:11:37.305
they would still be able[br]to build the mount.

0:11:37.475,0:11:39.558
It might take a little bit longer.

0:11:39.628,0:11:43.677
The same here: if half of our rovers[br]or robots don't arrive,

0:11:43.787,0:11:47.257
well, it will take a bit longer,[br]but we'll still be able to do it.

0:11:47.340,0:11:50.446
Here we even have three different robots.

0:11:50.446,0:11:55.164
In the back, you see the digger,[br]it is really good at digging regolith.

0:11:56.025,0:11:59.415
Then, we have the transporter,

0:11:59.415,0:12:02.832
great at taking regolith[br]and bringing it to the structure.

0:12:03.192,0:12:04.212
And the last ones -

0:12:04.212,0:12:05.974
the little ones with little legs-

0:12:05.974,0:12:10.489
what they do is[br]they sit on a layer of regolith,

0:12:10.489,0:12:12.279
microwave it together,

0:12:12.279,0:12:16.063
and layer by layer[br]create that dome structure.

0:12:20.352,0:12:22.135
We also wanted to try that out,

0:12:22.675,0:12:26.004
so we went out on a workshop,[br]and we created

0:12:27.154,0:12:29.884
our own swarm of robots.

0:12:30.534,0:12:31.531
Here we go.

0:12:31.531,0:12:34.523
We built ten of those -[br]it's a small swarm -

0:12:35.343,0:12:40.820
and we took six tons of sand,[br]and we tried out how these little robots

0:12:40.820,0:12:45.085
would actually be able to move[br]sand around - Earth sand in this case.

0:12:46.496,0:12:48.505
They were not teleoperated, right?

0:12:48.505,0:12:50.620
Nobody was telling them[br]to go left, go right,

0:12:50.620,0:12:53.360
or giving them a pre-described path.

0:12:53.360,0:12:58.694
No, they were given a task:[br]move sand from this area to that area.

0:12:59.142,0:13:02.086
And if they came[br]across an obstacle, like a rock,

0:13:02.086,0:13:05.876
they had to sort it out themselves,[br]or they came across another robot

0:13:05.876,0:13:08.078
that'd be able to make decisions.

0:13:09.018,0:13:12.031
Or even if half of them fell out,[br]the batteries died,

0:13:12.031,0:13:15.580
they still had to be able[br]to finish that task.

0:13:17.058,0:13:20.479
Now, I talked about redundancy.

0:13:21.879,0:13:25.145
But that was not only with the robots,[br]it was also with the habitat.

0:13:25.579,0:13:29.295
On the Mars project,[br]we decided to do three domes.

0:13:31.312,0:13:36.145
Because if one didn't arrive,[br]the other two could still form a base.

0:13:36.149,0:13:38.280
And that was mainly[br]because each of the domes

0:13:38.280,0:13:41.860
actually has a life support system[br]built in the floor,

0:13:42.310,0:13:44.360
so they can work independently.

0:13:45.600,0:13:49.021
It was also in this project that we[br]started to think a little bit more:

0:13:49.021,0:13:53.429
"How is it for an astronaut[br]or cosmonaut to live in a base?"

0:13:54.389,0:13:56.636
Again, look at precedence.

0:13:56.846,0:13:59.295
Here is the International Space Station.

0:13:59.645,0:14:03.240
I don't know about you,[br]but I wouldn't really want to live

0:14:03.240,0:14:06.150
in that space for six months or a year.

0:14:06.860,0:14:09.508
It is really living inside a machine.

0:14:10.678,0:14:15.291
Well, maybe science fiction gives us[br]better clues, right, in the movie "Moon."

0:14:16.350,0:14:21.718
Often in science fiction you'll see[br]very sleek clinical spaces

0:14:22.590,0:14:24.541
and also loads of corridors,

0:14:24.541,0:14:27.071
in science fiction,[br]loads of corridors, all the time.

0:14:27.541,0:14:29.933
And knowing what we know now,

0:14:29.943,0:14:32.833
what we don't have in space is space.

0:14:33.765,0:14:36.873
So, it may be not[br]such a good example either.

0:14:38.303,0:14:40.442
But I think this is a good example.

0:14:40.962,0:14:44.293
This is Halley VI, [br]the British Antarctic Survey,

0:14:44.593,0:14:46.882
it is the British base in the Antarctic.

0:14:49.492,0:14:54.175
What is interesting here is that[br]the base is in a very harsh climate,

0:14:54.385,0:14:55.675
especially in winter.

0:14:56.735,0:15:00.259
On top of that, it is very isolated.

0:15:00.569,0:15:04.169
It is actually not possible[br]to get evacuated from Halley VI

0:15:04.169,0:15:05.683
during winter months.

0:15:05.923,0:15:09.251
It's easier to get evacuated from the ISS,[br]International Space Station,

0:15:09.251,0:15:10.579
than it is from Halley VI.

0:15:10.579,0:15:13.726
So, we went and spoke to people there -

0:15:14.226,0:15:16.746
well, not there, the ones[br]that were in London,

0:15:16.746,0:15:18.806
who stayed there earlier -

0:15:19.136,0:15:21.883
and had long conversations[br]about it with them.

0:15:22.943,0:15:27.181
A lot of things came up, and one[br]of the things they mentioned a lot was:

0:15:27.400,0:15:30.580
"Well, you know, imagine,[br]we live and also work there.

0:15:30.771,0:15:35.307
So, we live and work in the same place;[br]it's like living in your own office."

0:15:36.227,0:15:37.667
How does that work?

0:15:38.450,0:15:43.240
And they said, they really[br]missed tactile things.

0:15:44.000,0:15:45.524
Tactile, what does that mean?

0:15:45.524,0:15:47.904
"Look at what we did," they said.

0:15:47.904,0:15:51.364
"We put up, we took some crates,

0:15:51.364,0:15:53.804
some packaging crates[br]that we had laying around,

0:15:53.804,0:15:55.904
some plywoods, put it on the wall,

0:15:55.904,0:15:58.444
put some rope around,[br]and we kind of built this thing.

0:15:58.444,0:16:01.894
So, it felt a little bit more homey,[br]a bit more tactile."

0:16:03.534,0:16:06.954
And tactile was the word[br]they not only used for the wood surfaces,

0:16:06.954,0:16:10.184
they also said, "Oh, we're also[br]growing our own lettuce now,

0:16:10.194,0:16:13.974
because all the food we have is great,[br]it is frozen or is in tins,

0:16:13.974,0:16:18.244
but what we miss is just[br]something crunchy, something tactile."

0:16:18.854,0:16:23.374
So, we took these ideas into the interior[br]of our base and, you know,

0:16:23.374,0:16:28.114
why not have a wooden floor[br]in a Mars base?

0:16:28.474,0:16:30.138
This might not be a plank of wood,

0:16:30.138,0:16:35.184
this might be a thin layer of veneer[br]on a top of some carbon fiber boards.

0:16:36.094,0:16:38.984
And why not grow some vegetables?

0:16:39.314,0:16:43.584
These Mars bases wouldn't be able[br]to sustain themselves with food,

0:16:43.964,0:16:49.764
but one could grow some things [br]to get some crunchy lettuce now and then.

0:16:52.224,0:16:54.764
Windows, very important.

0:16:55.773,0:17:01.143
This is a Cupola, the most popular place[br]in the International Space Station,

0:17:02.104,0:17:07.203
designed in 1987, installed in 2010.

0:17:07.393,0:17:09.763
Took 23 years, why?

0:17:10.378,0:17:13.228
It was not because[br]it was technically so difficult, no.

0:17:13.550,0:17:18.335
It was mainly because from a pure[br]technical engineering point of view,

0:17:19.015,0:17:20.575
it's not necessary.

0:17:21.019,0:17:27.663
But from a human perspective,[br]it is the best place in the space station.

0:17:28.053,0:17:33.293
So, we very much took that idea[br]and implemented it in our Moon base,

0:17:33.653,0:17:37.283
and had skylights[br]bringing in natural daylight.

0:17:38.993,0:17:44.573
And take it also into the Mars base[br]and here in the lab space.

0:17:44.773,0:17:49.863
Why not have some natural[br]Mars daylight coming in?

0:17:54.233,0:17:57.583
In a way you might think,[br]well, this is pretty crazy.

0:17:58.633,0:18:02.543
Why would you as an architect[br]get involved in space,

0:18:03.043,0:18:06.554
because it's such a technical field?

0:18:08.334,0:18:11.205
Well, I am actually really convinced

0:18:11.205,0:18:14.765
that from a creative view[br]or a design view,

0:18:14.765,0:18:20.253
you are able to solve really hard[br]and really constrained problems,

0:18:21.043,0:18:24.733
and I really feel that there is a place[br]for design and architecture

0:18:24.733,0:18:28.383
in projects like[br]interplanetary habitation.

0:18:28.923,0:18:30.025
Thank you.

0:18:30.025,0:18:32.606
(Applause)