Title: Life-support system - Wikipedia
Headings: Life-support system
Life-support system
Contents
Human physiological and metabolic needs
Atmosphere
Water
Food
Space vehicle systems
Gemini, Mercury, and Apollo
Space Shuttle
Soyuz
Plug and play
Space station systems
Skylab
Salyut and Mir
Bigelow commercial space station
Natural systems
Underwater and saturation diving habitats
Experimental life-support systems
MELiSSA
CyBLiSS
See also
Footnotes
References
Further reading
External links

Content: It must be stored, used, and reclaimed (from waste water) efficiently since no on-site sources currently exist for the environments reached in the course of human space exploration. Future lunar missions may utilise water sourced from polar ices; Mars missions may utilise water from the atmosphere or ice deposits. Food
All space missions to date have used supplied food. Life-support systems could include a plant cultivation system which allows food to be grown within buildings or vessels. This would also regenerate water and oxygen. However, no such system has flown in space as yet. Such a system could be designed so that it reuses most (otherwise lost) nutrients. This is done, for example, by composting toilets which reintegrate waste material (excrement) back into the system, allowing the nutrients to be taken up by the food crops. The food coming from the crops is then consumed again by the system's users and the cycle continues.