Launching an Advanced Manufacturing Institute in SPACE
Time for a Concerted Effort to Explore Manufacturing in Microgravity Environments
Space is emerging as the next frontier for advanced manufacturing. The market alone for biomanufacturing in space is expected to reach nearly $3 billion by the mid-2030s. Similar microgravity markets exist in other engineering and technology areas.
Accordingly, the administration and Congress need a coordinated effort to take advantage of the incredible opportunity of manufacturing at scale in the microgravity environment. As a recent gathering of corporations, federal agencies, scientists, and engineers examining biomanufacturing in space noted: “The formation of a public-private consortium is needed to further prioritize opportunities, de-risk space-based research and development (R&D) and guide the translation of results into commercial applications on Earth.”
Through current research on the International Space Station (ISS), important steps have been taken to explore the world of manufacturing in microgravity environments. With the incredible interest of the private sector in developing new science platforms in space, and the recent NASA announcement of $400 million in funding for private firms to support next-generation space stations, the time is ripe for a new concerted effort.
Since 2014, Manufacturing USA Institutes have been created to secure U.S. global leadership in advanced manufacturing by connecting people, ideas, and technology in fields as diverse as robotic research and bio-fabrication. This policy and funding tool can be used to help coordinate the various actors in the emerging areas of opportunity in advanced manufacturing on the ground and in orbit.
Now is the time to launch a new Manufacturing USA institute to support manufacturing research and manufacturing at scale in low Earth orbit (LEO) and build the space workforce of the future. Call it the Advanced Manufacturing Institute in SPACE (Space Platforms Advancing Competitive Engineering).
Manufacturing USA Provides the Ideal Framework for Collaboration
NASA is working with other U.S. government agencies, industry, and academia to define national priorities and high-value opportunities for advanced materials and manufacturing that will ensure continued U.S. preeminence in several emerging in-space production technologies while supporting development of a robust low-Earth-orbit economy. But other federal agencies are interested in manufacturing in low-gravity environments.
For example, DARPA’s Biological Technology Office just issued a proposal for its B-SURE (biomanufacturing, survival, utility, and reliability) research program. The National Science Foundation (NSF) has funded research into micro-fluidics on the ISS, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has supported microgravity research in several research areas.
But private industry is the latest entrant in supporting new space research platforms and exploring the role microgravity can play in advanced manufacturing. At the August 2021 conference on bio-manufacturing in space, representatives from Pfizer, Genentech, Fujifilm, IBM, Johnson and Johnson, Novartis, and Axiom Space attended, along with universities, including the University of Pittsburg, MIT, Emory University, and UC San Diego. Some speculated we are in a space race for the future of medicine. To link the many players interested in manufacturing in space, a new manufacturing institute sponsored by Manufacturing USA is needed. The institute can also begin to discuss the regulatory framework needed with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for approving new drugs and devices manufactured in space.
Manufacturing USA was created on a bipartisan basis by Congress and the Obama administration in 2014, on the recommendation of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, to secure U.S. global leadership in advanced manufacturing by connecting people, ideas, and technology. Sixteen manufacturing institutes have been created across manufacturing domains including manufacturing biopharmaceuticals, bio-fabrication, robotic research, solar energy, battery storage, and other technologies.
Manufacturing USA institutes convene business competitors, academic institutions, and other stakeholders to test applications of new technology, create new products, reduce cost and risk, and enable the manufacturing workforce with the skills of the future.
Since their founding, the Manufacturing USA institutes have received support from Congress and have worked with over 2,000 member organizations, collaborated on over 500 major R&D collaboration projects, engaged over 70,000 people with workforce knowledge and skills in advanced manufacturing, and invested over $400 million in activities from state, industry, and federal funds.
The Manufacturing USA network is operated by the interagency Advanced Manufacturing National Program Office, which is headquartered in NIST and the Department of Commerce. The office operates in partnership with the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, NASA, NSF, and the departments of Education, Agriculture, Health and Human Services (HHS), and Labor.
Broad Benefits: The ISS and Next-Generation Space Research Platforms in Engineering
Since the development of the ISS, NASA has been encouraging its use for research purposes. In recent years it has identified four primary areas of interest to be explored on the ISS:
- Advanced Materials: Examples include metal-organic frameworks and metamaterials, ceramics, container-less processing, exotic glasses and fibers, and alloys.
- Crystal Production: Examples include inorganic crystals, large and small molecule crystals, uniform protein crystals, and industrial-sized crystals.
- Thin Film Deposition: Examples include semiconductors, graphene, and artificial retinas.
- Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine: Examples include tissue chips and organoids for disease modeling, stem cell production, and 3D bio-fabrication.
In 2020, Houston-based company Axiom Space received a NASA contract worth up to $140 million to deliver at least one habitable private module to the ISS. Axiom plans to launch its first element to the orbiting lab in late 2024, then send up several more over the next few years. Eventually, the connected Axiom modules will detach from the ISS, creating a new space research platform.
In March 2021, the ISS joined the Association of University Research Parks (AURP), a global nonprofit, becoming the world’s first research park in the sky. In October 2021, Nanoracks, a private space research firm, designated its collection of hardware on the ISS as the George Washington Carver Science Park.
In October 2021, AURP hosted a Space Day as part of its international conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, featuring NASA’s chief economist and representatives from the ISS, discussing prospects for manufacturing in space. (AURP will continue the conversation about biomanufacturing in space as part of AURP Bio Health Caucus meeting, June 12–13, 2022, presented before the BIO conference begins in person in San Diego, California.)
In early December, NASA announced it had awarded three funded Space Act agreements valued at a total of $415.6 million to Blue Origin, Nanoracks, and Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation to help spur more work in building next-generation private-sector space research platforms.
Other companies, such as Space Tango and Sierra Space, an offshoot from Sierra Nevada and Space Tango, are working on their own LEO space research efforts to open more scientific opportunities. Meanwhile, China is building its Tiangong space station, which is the first phase of an expected long-term investment in building space stations in LEO. Russia and India are not far behind in building their own LEO space stations.
A SPACE Manufacturing Institute would have a major economic impact not just in space, but on the ground and across the country, linking traditional and emerging space-technology centers, engineering research regionss, and biotechnology centers, among others. Space states, such as Florida, Alabama, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, and Maryland, will help link with traditional manufacturing in midwestern states, and in places not normally expected. For example, Space Tango is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky and Sierra Space has major research operations in Madison Wisconsin.
Existing NASA programs benefit all 50 states, as it noted in a 2020 economic impact study. And NASA’s University Space Grant Consortium, housed in every state in the Union, would also be a strong element to link into the SPACE Manufacturing Institute. Nanoracks has recruited Ohio State University in its research efforts and Blue Origin has tapped Arizona State University to lead a consortium of other research universities to assist that firm in space manufacturing research.
So, to harness the many opportunities in manufacturing in space, from biomanufacturing to advanced manufacturing and across federal, academic, and private sectors, Congress and the White House should look to the sky and launch a SPACE USA Manufacturing Institute. The new technologies developed in space will advance U.S. competitiveness and have the potential to radically improve life on Earth.
