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The Atmospheric Revitalization System (ARS) provides carbon dioxide removal, trace contaminant control, and gas constituent analysis. In this field, the interest of RecycLAB [5], the TAS-I Advanced Live Support Research & Development laboratory is directed to trace gas contaminants removal and monitoring. During manned space mission, the decontamination of cabin or rack air after contingency events such as fire or pyrolysis is a priority for the crew safety. In this paper, basic zeolites, obtained by impregnation of common zeolites with a basic oxide, are used to remove acid gas contaminants from air stream. A multi-functional system, able to accommodate reactors of different shape, characteristics and set-up, is used at this purpose. This breadboard, called ZEUS (Zeolites for an Environmental-control Unit in Space), is made of AISI 316L stainless steel and consists of a closed loop, in which the inner volume is completely isolated from the external environment.

Crews of future exploration missions will be exposed for long time to a unique powerful mix of cosmic radiation. Starting from REMSIM study for ESA, we are focusing on short and long term shielding experiments aboard ISS (ESCHILO, ALTCRISS, SOFOCLE) by comparing the materials used in inflatable structures with the typical rigid materials used in current spacecraft, and optimizing and validating the radiation shielding solutions in LEO. To assess shielding strategies, tests in flight are always supported by calculations and laboratory experiments. The paper reports descriptions and available results of the above experiments.

In the frame of the multi-disciplinary programme MoMa-COUNT [2], multi-functional protections for human space exploration are being investigated, paying particular attention to flexible materials, selected also for their single excellent structural, thermal and other environmental performances. These flexible materials in general have poorly known space radiation properties, whose lack of characterisation propagates the uncertainty about the shielding efficiency against the radiation environment on the whole spacecraft protection means. The consequent evaluation of their shielding efficiency, as well as of that of the overall shields, is based on flight experiments performed in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), onboard the International Space Station (ISS) and the re-entry capsule Foton. In parallel, supporting dedicated ground experiments in accelerators, as well as Monte Carlo simulations, are performed.