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Advanced projects envisage multiple EVAs on the planetary surface and great distances to be covered by EVA astronauts during manned Mars missions. Astronauts' egress with special Martian EVA space suits on can be provided only through the landing module/spacecraft airlock. To move over the planet, astronauts are expected both to walk and use a planetary rover (Martian rover). To make EVA activities on the planetary surface successful, an optimized concept for space suit attachment both to the airlock and Martian rover should be developed. The paper considers concept options of the planetary space suit (PSS)/airlock and PSS/Martian rover mechanical interfaces based on patent information study and analysis of development, test and operation data for the EVA space suits.

Experimental evaluation is very important for space suit (SS) gloves design development. There are several ways to evaluate the SS gloves. One of the main ways is the method of expert (qualitative) and subjective evaluation which is used by an operator to evaluate mobility level, comfort, etc. using the glove box or space suit. The following methods of glove performance quantitative evaluation are also used: grasp/pinch force measurement, tactile feedback tests, dexterity determination during various types of work etc. The Zvezda's specialists proposed and researched an effective ergometric method in addition to the SS glove qualitative evaluation and instead of most methods for glove performance quantitative evaluation. This method makes it possible to evaluate objectively various characteristics of the gloves using quantitative determination of work performed by the gloved operator.