Sensor for assessing the risk of damage to astronauts’ DNA through quantification of its fragments, caused by exposure to cosmic radiation and dust (on the Moon, Mars, inside/outside the International Space Station)

Development of the sensor’s operation principle has been completed at Technology Readiness Level TRL4 in terms of science and design (under evaluation by the ESA-IDEA program).

Indicative space applications and services

Determination of non-biotoxic doses of exposure of astronauts to cosmic radiation and dusts, by improving the spacesuits and the metal structures of spacecraft and stations in the reflection and absorption of cosmic radiation, and in the retention of dusts by filtration systems.

An example of a direct space application of the experimental principle of the sensor on human (and extremophile) DNA damage by exposure to cosmic radiation is Stellar Discoveries’ participation in the BioSigN experiment (https://www.dlr.de/en/wr/research-transfer/projects/planetary-research/biosign) on the International Space Station (ISS), which is sponsored by ESA and the German Aerospace Center.