Research/ PLANETARY ROBOTICS
Novel Heating System for the Battery of a Lunar Rover
Fernando Loyola, Samreen Hoda, Abiola Ilori, Marcos Martinez, Gihan Ponweera, Abdulaziz Shinwari
The purpose of this project is to design a novel heating system following NASA material and design standards that can maintain the operating temperatures of the battery of a lunar rover for 100 hours of lunar night while reducing mass and power requirements of existing systems. Using exothermic chemical reactions as the basis for generating thermal power with minimal power requirements and high thermal conductivity heat plates as the method of heat transport, this system should generate and provide heat quickly to the battery. The proposed design should be capable of producing 1 W of thermal power per kg of mass added while generating enough energy to ensure the survival and operation of a lunar rover’s battery.