Aerospace

Monolite UK manufactures and markets DNA-1 Lunar Regolith Simulant and DNA-1M Martian Regolith Simulant for use in the aerospace field. Monolite UK is a supplier of the European Space Agency.

In 2007 Monolite UK played a key role in the revival of interest in colonization of the Moon and Mars by proposing to the European Space Agency to embark one of its rocket a D-Shape 3D printer, deploy, set up and Moon Outposts using local soil. ESA liked the idea, and in 2009 issued an Invitation to Tender titled ‘3D Printed Building Blocks Using Lunar Soil’. Monolite UK invited the Architectural Firm Foster and Partners in London, the aerospace company Alta (today Sitael) and the Scuola Superiore S. Anna of Pisa to form a consortium to participate in the Tender.

The consortium won the tender, and Monolite UK became Work Package Leader for the procurement of a Lunar regolith simulant and for the 3D printing of the technology demonstrator, a small brick, extracted from the digital file of the Moon Outpost designed by Foster.

During this work, the head of the WP Enrico Dini discovered in an ancient extinct volcano near Lake Bolsena, in Italy, a lunar regolith simulant that he baptized DNA-1 Regolith Simulant. This discovery made it possible to have the first European simulant and represented an unexpected result of the project.

Having large quantities of regolith available, the founder of D-Shape created and donated to the European Space Agency a portion of the outpost that is now exhibited in the ESA ESTEC museum in Nooddvijk in the Netherlands.

Monolite UK is involved in several projects involving the use of regolith for the manufacture of artifacts and building blocks with different technologies such as microwave, use as a filler with polymeric blowing agents and, of course, 3D printing.

A brochure of D-Shape lunar and martian regolith simulant is available upon request.