Airlock Module

What happens when you put an architect in charge of a lunar habitat, then lock the doors for two weeks?

In this episode of The Airlock Module Podcast, host Yuki Nishimura sits down with Marta Rossi, a PhD student in architecture specializing in space architecture at Politecnico di Torino and mission commander of the LunAres M7 analog mission in Poland. Marta shares how a simple master’s thesis decision turned into a lifelong path at the intersection of architecture and space, and why she describes architecture as “an o...

In this episode of The Airlock Module, Yuki sits down with Nadine Duursma, a TU Delft double-MSc student in Robotics & Space Engineering and visiting researcher at ESA’s Φ-lab. Fresh from the Monsaraz Mars Analog Mission, Portugal’s first, Nadine shares how her crew transformed an empty dome into a working habitat in 48 hours, then tackled EVAs in 35°C heat, rover tele-ops with latency, a drone drop emergency demo, plant growth trials, and searches for DNA traces in rocks. She also discusses her AI-based Tip & Cue satellite work a...

In this episode, we head to Homer, Alaska, where the northern lights glow and alpacas roam, to meet Laura Reiske: middle school math teacher, lifelong space nerd, and Chief of Staff for the APUS Analog Research Group. Laura shares how a love for black holes and clear Alaskan skies led her back to space, from NASA’s L’SPACE Mission Concept Academy (Deputy PM for Team SIGMA) to pursuing a master’s in Space Studies.

We dive into her first crewed analog at SAM in Arizona, where she commanded Team Red through a five-day isolation: tracking water, growin...

Meet Hanna, the first Armenian analog astronaut and a robotics engineering student charting her own course into space. We trace her leap from Buzz Lightyear–sparked curiosity to real-world missions: ground operations support on AMADEE-24 at ARMASH (Armenia), astronaut on the all-female LOTOS mission at the Analog Astronaut Training Center (Poland), and crew member on Terra Nova at LunAres (Poland) simulating Axiom-4. Hanna unpacks what it means to represent Armenia, how analog missions build resilient teams, and why soft-skills and cognitive training matter as much as hardware. It’s a fast, insp...

Dennis Miller embodies purpose, precision, and passion, on Earth and in analog space. As Chief of Operations and Flight Director for the APUS Analog Research Group, Dennis has led student teams through Mars-style simulations, drawing on two decades in the U.S. Marine Corps and his current work supporting NASA procurement at Goddard.  In this episode, Dennis traces his unlikely path from F-18 avionics and hospital respirator repair to multimillion-dollar reconstruction programs in Iraq, and eventually to mission planning for high-fidelity analogs. We unpack his “intent over instructions” approach, how to build schedules with buffers, and what real risk manag...

What will astronauts actually eat, and what can Mars menus teach us about feeding people on Earth? Yuki talks with Kristine Jane Atienza, public health nutritionist, founder of the Space Nutrition Network, and the first Filipino analog astronaut, about living and working at HI-SEAS, balancing calories, protein, and morale, and why cultural food identity (yes, adobo and rice!) belongs in space. Kristine also shares her path to NASTAR suborbital training, plans to help launch the first Space Food & Nutrition Lab at the Philippine Space Agency, and how her side project turning...