Advanced Control Systems for Small-Scale Space-Based Greenhouses

High Plant Cultivation Chamber (HPPC) will be an essential element of Closed Loop Environmental Control Systems for future extra-planetary manned outpost. In fact, it is the last compartment of the bio-regenerative loop aimed at the transformation of the crew metabolism's products absorbing CO2, producing fresh food and O-2 and purifying water. Computational Fluid Dynamics is an important tool to support the control system, to optimize food production and to predict the crop growth. In this paper a computational fluid dynamics model is applied to predict and study the transport processes inside a small plant chamber, in preparation of future developments for modeling and controlling HPCC inner climate. The CFD analyses are carried out considering the vegetation canopy, modeled as a porous region characterized by exchanges of momentum, energy and humidity with the air flow. The paper describes briefly the experimental system, the fluid dynamics and the plant models and preliminary results of parametrical analyses considering different boundary conditions. In the future, experiments will be carried out together with specific numerical simulations using the experimental conditions to provide first numerical-experimental correlations.