Ellen Arens

The Use of Tribocharging in the Electrostatic Beneficiation of Lunar Simulant

The use of tribocharging as a potential method to provide sufficient charge to several different lunar simulants for electrostatic beneficiation was investigated. The objective was to determine whether specific minerals of interest (e.g., ilmenite) that are present in lunar regolith could be enriched in concentration by beneficiation that would therefore allow for more efficient extraction for in situ resource utilization use. The production of oxygen, water, and other resources on the Moon from raw materials is vital for future missions to the Moon. Successful separation of ilmenite was achieved for a prepared simulant (KSC-1), which is a mixture of pure commercially supplied pyroxene, olivine, feldspar, and ilmenite, in a 4 : 4 : 1 : 1 ratio, showing proof of concept when tribocharged against three different charging materials, namely, Al, Cu, and PTFE. Separation by chemical composition was also observed for existing lunar simulants JSC-1 and JSC-1A; however, the interpretation of the separation was difficult due to the complex mineralogy of the simulants compared to the simple prepared mixture.

Tribocharging Lunar Simulant in Vacuum for Electrostatic Beneficiation

Electrostatic beneficiation of lunar regolith has potential application for separating minerals for material processing on the moon. This paper describes the use of tribocharging lunar simulant prior to mineral grain separation. The lunar simulant JSC‐1 was sieved into five size fractions: 100μm for characterization, however only the 50–75μm fraction was passed through aluminum, copper and polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) inclined plane chargers. The amount of charge acquired by the simulant is dependant upon the difference in the work function of the charging material and the mineral grain composition of the simulant itself. Various charge‐to‐mass ratios (Q/M) for the different tribocharging materials were obtained for JSC‐1 in vacuum as well as in air. XPS, SEM and Raman spectroscopy were used to evaluate the JSC‐1 simulant before and after beneficiation. Results indicate notable changes in mineral composition between pre‐ and post‐beneficiation samples after only a sin...

Optimization of the photovoltaic powered systems with dust mitigation technology for future lunar and martian missions

The dust mitigation technologies are critical for deployment of photovoltaic (PV) arrays in remote, dusty atmospheres such as the surface of the Moon, Mars and even Earth. As dust collects on the photovoltaic modules, the amount of light hitting the surface is decreased, thus decreasing the overall power output. In general, it is not practicable to use moving parts in high-dust areas due to the damaging effects dust has on joints and electronics. We developed a hybrid experimental system that incorporates a transparent Electrodynamic Screen (EDS) with a PV array allowing us to study the total efficiency of different technologies (GaAs, Mono Si and Multi Si). In order to give a qualitative and quantitative analysis of performance measures of solar cells with the integrated EDS technologies, prototypes were developed and tested in the indoor and outdoor conditions. The effect of the UV aging on the EDS coatings were performed in a Q-Sun Xenon Test Chamber Model Xe-3-H. The Jasco V-670 Spectrophotometer was used to measure the UV/Vis transmission in the wavelength range from 190 nm to 750 nm before and after each UV aging increment of 99 hours.