Prepared by: Mustafa Al-Zoubi
NASA has turned to artificial intelligence to design space mission hardware at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, that resembles bone, weighs less, carries higher structural loads, and requires a fraction of the time it takes humans to evolve.
“It looks rather strange,” said engineer Ryan McClelland, who is in charge of the project.
To create the parts using AI, with the requirements of the task, scientists paint surfaces; Where the part connects to the instrument or spacecraft, including any screws, electronic connections, and other hardware, the designer may also need to block a path; So that the algorithm does not block the laser beam or the optical sensor.
More complex constructions require room for the technician’s hands to maneuver for assembly and alignment.
“These advanced parts save up to two-thirds of the weight compared to conventionally designed components,” the researchers said.
“You can design, analyze, fabricate part of a prototype, have it in hand in less than a week, and it can be radically fast compared to the way we used to work,” McClelland said.
“We found that parts designed with the algorithm do not have the stress concentrations that you have with human designs, and the stress factors are approximately 10 times lower than parts designed by a human expert designer,” he added.
