Mission Design Drivers for Life Support

The MaMBA-concept for an extraterrestrial base and its first module mock-up

“…Note that a BLSS would be too costly in terms of launch mass if the goals were relatively short missions (∼ 1 a or less) to "only" the Moon [47]. However, since most consider Mars their long-term goal, rather than the Moon, we believe that a lunar habitat should include a BLSS so it can be tested thoroughly before being needed for a long-duration mission on Mars (we expect a Mars habitat to be used for at least 10 years).…”