HOUSTON – Since the days of Mercury flights, astronauts have been connected to myriad electronic sensors that monitor their vital signs.
Some astronauts are wired with electrodes, while some sensors might even be swallowed or placed where the sun doesn’t shine.
However, nanotechnology inspired biosensors may change that, making spacecraft like the space shuttle simpler, safer and more efficient operations.
"Basically what we want to do is get rid of the wires, the cables and all the tubes that encumber a patient or a person in the space shuttle," said Suzanne Ahn, M.D.
Ahn, an executive with Ball Semiconductor Inc. an Allen, Texas-based company, told assembled researchers at NanoSpace 2000 about a sensor being developed by her company that exists on a about .03 inch (1 millimeter) silicon sphere.
The sphere provides 3-D sensing and can have an antenna wrapped around it for wireless operation. Within the decade, Ahn said the sensor’s size should be reduced to about 20 microns or about .0007 of an inch (one twenty-millionth of a meter).
Astronauts could swallow the inexpensive sensor and it would monitor their vital signs, she said. The nanosensors could also be developed as accelerometers for cars or aircraft and other applications needing monitoring of temperature or pressure.
Ahn said the sensors could show up in operating rooms as a means of tracking surgical instruments and sponges.
"When you have major surgery, the doctors have to do a sponge count before opening and before closing the patient to make sure nothing gets left behind," she said. "It’s done by hand and if you have a miscount you have to bring an X-ray in and read the film and locate where you may have left something."
The electronically tagged instruments would be able to indicate where they were with a scanner, she said.
Nanotechnology and biosensors may play a key role in improving and making spacecraft safer and simpler.
John Graf, of Johnson Space Center’s Advanced Life Support Program, said researchers face challenges in recycling water, as well as in the heating and cooling of spacecraft. He said he hopes to find some solutions with nanotechnology.
"We need a change of architecture and to see how biosensors might be beneficial for us," he said. "We have the issue of the size and complexity of our systems to contend with."
Graf used as an example a system to be used on the International Space Station (ISS) that uses four tanks to purify water. A real-time system to filter and monitor the water quality would simply the system.
Heat transfer on spacecraft is another issue studied by the life support group, Graf said. Normally, spacecraft rotate much like a rotisserie to maintain an even temperature, but the ISS maintains a fixed position.
One proposal the life support group is looking at is a system of flat duct-like tubing with air flowing over the modules with sensors along the spacecraft to measure temperature.
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