Interstellar Lab's BioPod prepares for plant cultivation on the moon

Founded in 2018 by Barbara Belvisi, Interstellar Lab is a team of former Space X, Disney, Thales, Trimble and Safran employees coming together to realise a common goal: creating next-generation closed-loop, regenerative habitats, and agriculture systems that could sustain a full life on earth as well as the beyond.

And thus, the BioPod was born. The unique creation is an inflatable environmentally controlled plant cultivation pod with a resilient and modular design that is intended to go beyond the earth’s surface.

The design, which was first unveiled at the Future Investment Initiative in Riyad, has plans of adapting the BioPod for lunar missions in the next years, specifically geared for the NASA Artemis program which aims to bring humans to the moon by 2024. Along with the BioPod, the team also unveiled Experimental BIOregenerative Stations’ new modular design at FII.

The pod has been designed using Dassault Systems 3D Experience platform, and the first of this design is currently being built in Paris and will be opened to the public within the months of July to September. It works as a standalone system using advanced crop cultivation technology, and it can provide solutions for local, regenerative and efficient agriculture on earth as well. It is designed to foster bio-diversity, turn carbon di-oxide to oxygen, close out the water loop and reduce the land need factor by a 100.

The EBIOS module was a design that combines different pods, and was presented in November 2019. Keeping modularity as one of the key factors in her design, Barbara Belvisi, who is the CEO and Product Lead at Interstellar Lab, said, “We want to develop systems and habitats easy to transport and install, working as a stand-alone but also combined.” The EBIOS modules can also be attached to form stations of modular size, ideal for future space-manned missions and space bases.

The team has been mainly focusing on the design for four main pods: The BioPod, the habitat, the tunnel and the connector. All of these units are environmentally controlled, and communicate through an air-lock system.

The BioPod follows the modular principle in design, durable and easily deployable. It combines advanced crop cultivation technology with predictive monitoring to achieve high-precision agriculture. It is built out of high-performance materials which are resistant under extreme climate conditions. Its integrated, advanced atmospheric and full closure water system allows the creation of specific environmental conditions that can grow a diverse array of crops and plants that would not survive in traditional indoor farming models.

“We believe space technologies can help design solutions for the earth, more specifically when it comes to regenerative and closed-loop systems. If we can design a greenhouse for Mars, then we must use this knowledge back on earth. The BioPod is the exact demonstration of this approach that we have at Interstellar Lab," say the creators.