Building Habitats on the Moon

Designing a habitat for the lunar surface? You will need toknow more than structural engineering. There are the effectsof meteoroids, radiation, and low gravity. Then there are thepsychological and psychosocial aspects of living in close quarters,in a dangerous environment, far away from home. All these must beconsidered when the habitat is sized, materials specified, and structuredesigned. This book provides an overview of various concepts for lunar habitatsand structural designs and characterizes the lunar environment - thetechnical and the nontechnical. The designs take into considerationpsychological comfort, structural strength against seismic and thermalactivity, as well as internal pressurization and 1/6 g. Also discussed aremicrometeoroid modeling, risk and redundancy as well as probabilityand reliability, with an introduction to analytical tools that can beuseful in modeling uncertainties.