G Sanders
Papers
1
Total Citations
5
H-Index
1
About
Gerald Sanders is a pioneering figure in space resource utilization, with a career dedicated to enabling sustainable human exploration beyond Earth. His primary research areas center on in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), particularly the extraction and processing of resources on the Moon and Mars to produce life support consumables and propellant. Sanders’ most notable contribution is his architectural analysis of producing oxygen from Martian resources for use as propellant in a Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV), a concept critical to reducing the mass and cost of human missions to Mars. His 2022 paper on this topic, which has garnered 5 citations, systematically evaluates trade-offs between different propellant supply architectures, demonstrating how ISRU can dramatically alter mission design. As the lead for NASA’s ISRU development efforts, Sanders has shaped the agency’s strategic roadmap, advocating for technologies like lunar water extraction and Mars atmospheric processing. His work bridges engineering and mission planning, showing how local resource utilization can transform exploration from a “bring everything” approach to a sustainable, self-sufficient model. Sanders’ impact extends through his leadership in international collaborations and his role in defining the technology demonstrations needed for future human outposts.
Research Focus
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Top Papers
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