In space, no one can hear you blush. But that doesn't mean the International Space Station doesn't deserve a pee-like toilet for an astronaut.
The International Space Station is receiving new toilets this year. NASA's Universal Waste Management System (UWMS) is an upgrade from current space toilet technology that will help facilitate mixed crews and be easier to use.
The toilets currently on the US side of the space station were designed in the 1990s. This means that obsolete toilets have some problems, including being "sensitive to crew alignment on the seat and can cause accidental fouling of the collection material with feces, "according to a detailed review by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Older toilets have also been criticized for their failure to "capture and ease of use for simultaneous urination and defecation for mixed teams".
The new toilet will solve these problems by rethinking the shape and volume of the seat. The new toilet system also has a lower mass than previous systems, is easier to use, offers increased comfort and performance to the crew and treats urine so that it can be safely treated by spacecraft recycling systems, "according to a NASA report on Monday.
The new toilets will also adapt a special function already used on a different toilets on the russian side from the space station. This will help astronauts better anchor themselves in microgravity by hanging their feet under toe bars, instead of the thigh bars of American restrooms.
Although these new toilets seem out of this world, NASA has yet to tackle its larger goals of designing a waste system that offers greater storage options for longer missions in places like Mars.
One of these goals is to design a waste system that can "stabilize and dry metabolic waste to make it microbial inactive and eventually reuse that water," said Jim Broyan, deputy director of the environmental monitoring and NASA life support technology.
This new universal waste management system will remain on the ISS until the end of the life of the space station. The delivery of the new toilets to the space station is scheduled for fall.
