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Engineers in Hong Kong have created a 3D printable building material for Mars that uses the planet’s own soil, held together by yeast engineered to behave like mussel glue. The material, developed at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) under civil engineer Jishen Qiu, has passed compression tests at strength levels comparable to lightweight concrete, a threshold researchers say makes it viable for multi-storey, fully recyclable structures on the Red Planet. The findings were published in the journal Chem Circularity.
A three-ingredient formula for an alien building site
The compound rests on three components, each chosen to solve a different problem of building far from Earth. The bulk of the material is Martian regolith, the loose layer of dust, sand, pebbles and