Students at Rhode Island School of Design are part of a new effort in astronaut training. The students helped design an imitation spacesuit to be used for training, solving a problem posed by actual spacesuits, which are too heavy and expensive.
Michael Lye is coordinating the NASA Project at RISD. He said no training suit has been able to fulfill astronaut needs and remain cost effective, until now.
“The suit is really trying to replicate what it feels like to wear a real spacesuit but do it here on earth in a way that is affordable, practical, but still simulates all the problems that astronauts face while wearing a spacesuit.”
In January the suit will be sent to Hawaii to the NASA Mars simulation training center.