Direct In-Situ Growth of CNTs on Pristine Lunar Simulants

Introduction: In-space manufacturing is an emerging technology that focuses on synthesizing materials for various purposes while reducing the payload from Earth. This study reports a recent achievement in the direct synthesis of nanomaterials using fine particles of lunar regolith simulant.
The research demonstrates the conversion of organic waste materials, specifically methane, into valuable carbon nanotubes (CNTs) using plasma with the optimum argon and hydrogen contents. These nanotubes act as fillers in voids and provide crack-bridging, resulting in strength improvements and optimizing the performance of host matrices such as lunar regolith-based geopolymers and shielding materials.
The hypothesis of this study is to test the feasibility of growing CNTs on lunar regolith simulant particles. Previous studies have shown that CNTs can be synthesized on fly ash particles, making this hypothesis testable. For this study, two types of lunar regolith simulants—JSC-1A and CSM-LHT- 1—were selected.