TY - JOUR
T1 - Nitrogen cycling in Bioregenerative Life Support Systems
T2 - Challenges for waste refinery and food production processes
AU - Clauwaert, Peter
AU - Muys, Maarten
AU - Alloul, Abbas
AU - De Paepe, Jolien
AU - Luther, Amanda
AU - Sun, Xiaoyan
AU - Ilgrande, Chiara
AU - Christiaens, Marlies E.R.
AU - Hu, Xiaona
AU - Zhang, Dongdong
AU - Lindeboom, Ralph E.F.
AU - Sas, Benedikt
AU - Rabaey, Korneel
AU - Boon, Nico
AU - Ronsse, Frederik
AU - Geelen, Danny
AU - Vlaeminck, Siegfried E.
PY - 2017/5/1
Y1 - 2017/5/1
N2 - In order to sustain human life in an isolated environment, an efficient conversion of wasted nutrients to food might become mandatory. This is particularly the case for space missions where resupply from earth or in-situ resource utilization is not possible or desirable. A combination of different technologies is needed to allow full recycling of e.g. nitrogenous compounds in space. In this review, an overview is given of the different essential processes and technologies that enable closure of the nitrogen cycle in Bioregenerative Life Support Systems (BLSS). Firstly, a set of biological and physicochemical refinery stages ensures efficient conversion of waste products into the building blocks, followed by the production of food with a range of biological methods. For each technology, bottlenecks are identified. Furthermore, challenges and outlooks are presented at the integrated system level. Space adaptation and integration deserve key attention to enable the recovery of nitrogen for the production of nutritional food in space, but also in closed loop systems on earth.
AB - In order to sustain human life in an isolated environment, an efficient conversion of wasted nutrients to food might become mandatory. This is particularly the case for space missions where resupply from earth or in-situ resource utilization is not possible or desirable. A combination of different technologies is needed to allow full recycling of e.g. nitrogenous compounds in space. In this review, an overview is given of the different essential processes and technologies that enable closure of the nitrogen cycle in Bioregenerative Life Support Systems (BLSS). Firstly, a set of biological and physicochemical refinery stages ensures efficient conversion of waste products into the building blocks, followed by the production of food with a range of biological methods. For each technology, bottlenecks are identified. Furthermore, challenges and outlooks are presented at the integrated system level. Space adaptation and integration deserve key attention to enable the recovery of nitrogen for the production of nutritional food in space, but also in closed loop systems on earth.
KW - CELSS
KW - Food production
KW - Organic waste
KW - Resource recovery
KW - Single cell protein
KW - Space
KW - Urine
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85018973467&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.paerosci.2017.04.002
DO - 10.1016/j.paerosci.2017.04.002
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85018973467
SN - 0376-0421
VL - 91
SP - 87
EP - 98
JO - Progress in Aerospace Sciences
JF - Progress in Aerospace Sciences
ER -