Lego bricks help millions of children and adults express their creativity. The range of possibilities is literally endless, and anything can be built from the elements with enough imagination and perseverance. However, now it seems that the company is taking the question of what exactly can be built from Lego to a much more serious level. It’s not as if the lifelike replica of the Lion of the Chain Bridge wasn’t a huge, eye-catching project, but the Denmark-based company’s current plan goes beyond all previous ideas:
In collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), they have begun working on how to build bases on the Moon using Lego bricks.
Of course, you don't have to think about the usual plastic cubes in all the colors of the rainbow, but there is something much better – but where did this idea come from?
Both NASA and the European Space Agency have been thinking about how to build lunar bases in the most efficient way for many years. Since we cannot find any raw material that could be used to build bases in general on the celestial body orbiting the Earth, it would seem logical to lift them from the Earth with rockets – however, this would be very expensive and difficult. It is a long process, and it is believed that it will not be possible to bring a sufficient amount of raw materials in one trip.
That's why ESA is working on solving the base structure so that only a minimum of raw materials are transported from Earth, and lunar features are mostly used. Here comes the role of Lego, regolith, and of course 3D printing.
Step by step, frame by frame
As is known, the surface of the Moon is covered in a thin layer of rock and mineral fragments called regolith, which can be used relatively easily to make so-called space bricks – the only problem is that there is not a lot of lunar regolith. Like the materials available on Earth for experimentation.
However, this wasn’t a real problem for the European Space Agency. They took a 4.5 million-year-old meteorite and chopped it up, and this crushed material ended up being the basis of a block that was eventually 3D printed in the shape of Lego bricks. And why Lego? Because the bricks are very simple to design, but more importantly, they can stick together perfectly without any fixing materials.
No one has ever built a base on the Moon before, so we have to figure out not only how to build it, but also what to make of it, because we can't take any materials with us.
– editing “My team and I love creative building, so we came up with the idea of seeing if it was possible to turn space dust into Lego-like bricks,” ESA scientist Aidan Cowley later added. “The result was impressive, and although the bricks look a little rougher than usual, it’s important that they have the same grip, allowing us to test our designs.”
You can see it yourself.
To demonstrate their key role in the development of potential lunar infrastructure, Lego and the European Space Agency are displaying some of the Lego pieces made from the 4.5 million-year-old meteorite around the world for you to see. Within the United States, you will be able to find stores in Minnesota, Florida, Chicago, California and New York where the space bricks will be, in addition, some of the pieces will also arrive in Europe: in London, Munich, Cologne, Copenhagen, Barcelona, Paris and Amsterdam it will be possible to take a closer look at the fruits of the collaboration between Lego and the European Space Agency.
(Cover image: 3D-printed LEGO cube from regolith / Image: ESA/ESA)
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