NASA L'SPACE Academy
Test Rig CAD render. The UV lights are mounted to the top adjustable plate while the fabric samples are kept in the glass test tubes.
NextGen Astronaut Nanofabric Outfit (NANO) Clothing System
The "Lunaris" team wrote and submitted a proposal to test the viability of fabric coated with silver nanoparticles as astronaut clothing in terms of its antimicrobial properties before, during, and after exposure to germicidal UVC light. For long-duration space missions, clothes will have to be reused to save cargo mass. Currently, there is no way of washing clothes in space. "Lunaris" sought to develop and test a fabric that could be actively cleaned using UVC light and passively cleaned using silver nanoparticles in the fabric. They wanted to test if a system like this would work at eliminating germs and odors.
They completed the proposal, submitted a New Technology Report, and submitted the paper to NASA for review. As part of the L'SPACE program, they reviewed other proposals using NASA's proposal grading criteria to both gain experience reading proposals and to understand how to improve their own.
Devin Ho's main contribution was to research and design a test method and a test rig to expose samples of fabric to UVC light and evaluate their antimicrobial properties and material degradation.
Due to the confidential nature of the proposal, more details cannot be shared.