Shirley Dyke, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Civil Engineering at Purdue University is the head of the school’s RETH (Resilient ExtraTerrestrial Habitats) Institute. Her work seeks an understanding of what characteristics make habitats safe through “cyber physical testing”, a discipline that combines computer models with physical testing to validate results. A habitat’s resilience level is paramount to this endeavor, which results in intelligently designed structures that mitigate risks of numerous hazards to humans anticipated in the lunar environment. Her team models the effects of meteoroid impacts, moon quakes, problems with lunar regolith (which is highly abrasive) and others that may impact the performance of outposts on the Moon.
