If we’re going to work and live on Mars, we need a place to live, right? There are all sorts of plans to bring habitats with us — something like an inflatable habitat.

That’s great and all, but you need to get it there. And extra mass means extra fuel. What if we could build a habitat when we get there?

That’s the question NASA asked to some ambition teams of engineers. Design a 3d-printer so to speak that uses the resources already on mars — like martian dust — to build a habitat.

Keegan Kirkpatrick is the Team Lead at RedWorks 3D  and he’s onto something.