This idea will rock the space industry, changing the status quo in space station design. This idea shows how important it is to bring the general public into this arena because this idea, an idea that will save money and improve the lifes of space explorers, come from a contest. Space stations have looked the same since their birth, from Salyut 1 to ISS, they have been a network of tubes. There is Bigelow Aerospace with it's expandable space station sections, but it is the same basic space station design, only puffy. Plus, the current trend in space station design does not allow for artificial gravity, endangering crews should they stay in space for more then a year and requiring that a crew be rotated.
But, the Gallagher Space Center, generated by the NASA's Create the Future design contest, gets around a major road block. Since this space station is in a ball, we can rotate it on it's X,Y, and Z axis (Correction: we can rotate it on one axis) and generate artificial gravity. This is due to the centrifugal force that is generated by a rotating object; the floor of the space station would feel like its pushing up on it's occupants, simulating gravity.
The only part I don't like about this design is the orientation of the living area, if it was flipped, so the floor would be concave, then we could generate artificial gravity. The way it is now, people would fall to the ceiling if we spun the station. But, this is a minor problem still the design is only on paper. Furthermore, the huge windows on this space station would make life much better aboard it and the station can be placed into orbit in a simlar method to the way "'Pringle Potato Chips' are packaged" and shipped, reducing lauch costs. (Create the Future 1) All in all, this design solves many of the problems with living in space.Thank you to The Design Blog for posting this, I would not have seen this if they had not posted the design. You can see the creator's post about his design and learn more about this briliant man on his website.
Update: You can see more on this idea here
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1: Dettler, Andre. "Gallagher Space Center". NASA Tech Befiefs and SolidWorks . 17 Oct. 2008. 10 Mar. 2009
