What does the future hold for Space travel?

The Moon. Mars. An icy moon of Jupiter. A near-Earth asteroid. In the not too distant future, missions to these destinations will launch from Earth.

Perhaps we can start with the B330 an inflatable space habitat being privately developed by Bigelow Aerospace. The craft will support zero-gravity research including scientific missions and manufacturing processes. Beyond its industrial and scientific purposes, however, it has potential as a destination for space tourism and a craft for missions destined for the Moon and Mars.

The benefits of using AI based systems to control space-exploring robots have been seen in previous NASA missions such as on the Spirit and Opportunity rovers in 2003, which had an AI driven system called Autonav that allowed them to explore Mars. AEGIS - Autonmous Exporation for Gathering Increased Science, has been using NASA Mars rover, Curiousity, using AI. It makes sense as robots can be sent to dangerous planets and asteroids first. AI powered satalites and Planet exploring buggies can be used to collect Scientific data.

Robots are being developed by NASA that will 3D print roads and buildings before astrnaughts arrive on Mars. Recently, a new planet was discovered by AI, with techology developed by Google on behalf of NASA

In July 2015, the Canadian company Thoth Technology secured a US patent for a space elevator tower designed to lift spacecraft to the upper reaches of Earth’s stratosphere. If constructed, the tower would stand 20km high and support a platform for launching and landing spacecrafts. Unlike ‘traditional’ space elevator designs, which lift material to space via a cable anchored to a geosynchronous satellite, Thoth Technology’s plan seeks to make space travel easier and more affordable by cutting out 12 vertical miles of the journey to space.

A SPACE FUTURE