Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2017

45 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2017 ASTRONAUTICS nauts. Exemplars of both the carrier and the spacecraft are currently in production and will be used in the first two missions, one of which should launch during the 2020s. The basic structure of the Deep Space Gate- way will include the Gateway Power- Propulsion Module, which will be used to generate elec- tricity on the space station; the Cislunar Habitation Module, which will be used for long periods of resi- dence on board the space station; the Gate- way Logistics Module, which will be used for experiments and logistics; and the Gateway Airlock Module, a compensation chamber that will be used to perform extravehicular ac- A t right, a schematic dis- play of the cislu- nar space. Below, a possible scene from life inside the housing mod- ule of the cislunar space station. [Lockheed Martin] tivities. The propulsion system will mainly use electricity for orbital corrections. In a second phase, likely to be years after the completion of the DSG, the plan is to create the Deep Space Transport, a reusable vehicle with elec- trical and chemical propulsion, specially de- signed for crewed missions towards Mars.