Planetary Surface Environment Testing: The Evolution of PLANET

Over the past four years, the Planetary, Lunar, & Asteroid Natural Environment Testbed (PLANET) has evolved from an ambitious concept to a fully functional test capability. Based at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, and operated by the Space Environmental Effects team, PLANET offers high-fidelity testing catering to Technology Readiness Level (TRL) advancement and rapid development of prototype systems. Centered around a 2-meter x 3-meter cylindrical vacuum chamber, PLANET goes beyond basic “dirty thermal-vacuum” systems, and adds solar radiation, electrons, protons, and plasma. The comprehensive environments allow investigators and engineers to expose their materials/mechanisms/devices to situations where realistic charging effects couple with thermal and regolith interactions to recreate a planetary surface environment in the laboratory. With the completion of basic commissioning, the MSFC team is now able to present details of PLANET with a focus on features that will appeal to experimentalists charged with verifying functionality in the most challenging conditions.