YUE · CU Boulder · Preliminary design
YUE: designing a habitat for Earth and lunar orbit.
I lead a ten-person team designing a free-flying habitat for Earth and lunar orbit, with lunar-orbit insertion and an EVA in lunar orbit.
The mission puts interfaces at the center
YUE is a free-flying habitat concept intended for operations in Earth and lunar orbit. The mission includes insertion into lunar orbit and an EVA there.
At this stage, the team is developing the preliminary architecture. I review subsystem proposals and the way each one affects the rest of the habitat, while keeping the design consistent with our mass, power, and cost budgets.
My responsibility across the team
I coordinate work across the subsystem teams, review trade-offs and technology readiness, and follow the mass, power, and cost budgets. Much of the work is checking how a proposed solution changes the requirements or constraints for other teams.
- Subsystem consistency: bring the individual proposals back to the mission requirements and shared budgets.
- Technology readiness: review what a subsystem concept relies on and how mature those technologies are.
- Team decisions: bring the different engineering arguments together and make the final choice when the team is divided.
A real design question: when should filtration start?
We are discussing whether to run the air-filtration system throughout the uncrewed phase or activate it 24 hours before crew arrival.
I currently favor later activation because it could reduce pre-crew power consumption and preserve filter life. It also introduces a dependence on a remote or automatic startup, so the activation sequence and the response to a failure become part of the decision.
| Design issue | Run from launch | Start 24 h before arrival |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-crew operation | Filtration runs during the uncrewed phase. | Operation begins closer to crew arrival. |
| Power & filter use | Longer operating time before the crew arrives. | Expected reduction in energy use and filter operation before arrival. |
| Activation | Avoids reliance on a later initial startup. | Relies on a successful remote or autonomous activation. |
| Verification question | How do we monitor performance through the uncrewed phase? | How do we confirm startup and respond if activation fails? |
Neither option can be chosen on power alone. Running from launch still requires evidence of continued performance; a later start requires confidence in activation and enough time to establish the cabin conditions needed for crew arrival.
Current status
Late activation is my preferred direction in the preliminary trade. The energy benefit, filter-life benefit, activation logic, and cabin-readiness requirements still need to be evaluated together.
Turning the preference into a defensible choice
The next step is to compare the options against the actual filtration power demand, operating duration, filter requirements, and startup behavior. We also need to define what confirms successful activation and what the design does if that confirmation is missing.
The 24-hour interval is a proposed operating choice. It still needs to be checked against the cabin-conditioning requirement and the subsystem design.
Learning to take responsibility for a decision
I enjoy tracing how a choice in one subsystem becomes a constraint in another. Managing the project has also shown me that bringing the team to a decision requires more than understanding those connections.
When there are several opinions, I have to understand the reasoning behind them, make the final call, and take responsibility for it. This project is helping me develop that side of systems engineering alongside the technical work.