An earth shelter, also called an earth house, earth bermed house, or underground house, is a structure with earth (soil) against the walls, on the roof, or that is entirely buried underground.
An airlock is a room or compartment which permits passage between environments of differing atmospheric pressure or composition, while minimizing the changing of pressure or composition between the differing environments.
An inflatable is an object that can be inflated with a gas, usually with air, but hydrogen, helium, and nitrogen are also used. One of several advantages of an inflatable is that it can be stored in a small space when not inflated, since inflatables depend on the presence of a gas to maintain their size and shape. Function fulfillment per mass used compared with non-inflatable strategies is a key advantage. Stadium cushions, impact guards, vehicle wheel inner tubes, emergency air bags, and inflatable space habitats employ the inflatable principle. Inflation occurs through several strategies: pumps, ram-air, blowing, and suction.
A basement or cellar is one or more floors of a building that are completely or partly below the ground floor. Especially in residential buildings, it often is used as a utility space for a building, where such items as the furnace, water heater, breaker panel or fuse box, car park, and air-conditioning system are located; so also are amenities such as the electrical system and cable television distribution point. In cities with high property prices, such as London, basements are often fitted out to a high standard and used as living space.
TransHab was a program pursued by NASA in the late 1990s to develop the technology for expandable habitats inflated by air in space. TransHab was intended as a replacement for the existing rigid International Space Station crew Habitation Module. When deflated, inflatable modules provide an 'easier to launch' compact form. When fully inflated, TransHab would expand to 8.2 metres (27 ft) in diameter.
The serous membrane is a smooth tissue membrane of mesothelium lining the contents and inner walls of body cavities, which secrete serous fluid to allow lubricated sliding movements between opposing surfaces. The serous membrane that covers internal organs is called visceral, while the one that covers the cavity wall is called parietal. For instance the parietal peritoneum is attached to the abdominal wall and the pelvic walls. The visceral peritoneum is wrapped around the visceral organs. For the heart, the layers of the serous membrane are called parietal and visceral pericardium. For the lungs they are called parietal and visceral pleura. The visceral serosa of the uterus is called the perimetrium. The potential space between two opposing serosal surfaces is mostly empty except for the small amount of serous fluid.
The Caves of Mars Project was an early 2000s program funded through Phase II by the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts to assess the best place to situate the research and habitation modules that a human mission to Mars would require. The final report was published in mid 2004.
In geotechnical engineering, a caisson is a watertight retaining structure used, for example, to work on the foundations of a bridge pier, for the construction of a concrete dam, or for the repair of ships.
A monolithic dome is a thin-shell structure cast in a one-piece form. The form may be permanent or temporary and may or may not remain part of the finished structure. Monolithic domes are a form of monolithic architecture.
An inflatable movie screen is an inflatable framework with an attached projection screen. Inflatable screens are used for outdoor movies, film festivals, drive-in theaters, sports, social, fundraising and other events requiring outdoor projection.
A vapor barrier is any material used for damp proofing, typically a plastic or foil sheet, that resists diffusion of moisture through the wall, floor, ceiling, or roof assemblies of buildings and of packaging to prevent interstitial condensation. Technically, many of these materials are only vapor retarders as they have varying degrees of permeability.
Inflatable space structures are structures which use pressurized air to maintain shape and rigidity. The technological approach has been employed from the early days of the space program with satellites such as Echo, to impact attenuation system that enabled the successful landing of the Pathfinder satellite and rover on Mars in 1997. Inflatable structures are also candidates for space structures, given their low weight, and hence easy transportability.
An air-supportedstructure is any building that derives its structural integrity from the use of internal pressurized air to inflate a pliable material envelope, so that air is the main support of the structure, and where access is via airlocks.
A cavity wall is a type of wall that has an airspace between the outer face and the inner, usually structural, construction. The skins typically are masonry, such as brick or cinder block. Masonry is an absorbent material that can retain rainwater or condensation. One function of the cavity is to drain water through weep holes at the base of the wall system or above windows. The weep holes provide a drainage path through the cavity that allows accumulated water an outlet to the exterior of the structure. Usually, weep holes are created by leaving out mortar at the vertical joints between bricks at regular intervals, by the insertion of tubes, or by inserting an absorbent wicking material into the joint. Weep holes are placed wherever a cavity is interrupted by a horizontal element, such as door or window lintels, masonry bearing angles, or slabs. A cavity wall with masonry as both inner and outer vertical elements is more commonly referred to as a double wythe masonry wall.
Damp proofing in construction is a type of moisture control applied to building walls and floors to prevent moisture from passing into the interior spaces. Dampness problems are among the most frequent problems encountered in residences.
Building insulation materials are the building materials that form the thermal envelope of a building or otherwise reduce heat transfer.
Masonry veneer walls consist of a single non-structural external layer of masonry, typically made of brick, stone or manufactured stone. Masonry veneer can have an air space behind it and is technically called "anchored veneer". A masonry veneer attached directly to the backing is called "adhered veneer". The innermost element is structural, and may consist of masonry, concrete, timber or metal frame.
A rainscreen is an exterior wall detail where the siding stands off from the moisture-resistant surface of an air/water barrier applied to the sheathing to create a capillary break and to allow drainage and evaporation. The rainscreen is the cladding or siding itself but the term rainscreen implies a system of building. Ideally the rainscreen prevents the wall air/water barrier from getting wet but because of cladding attachments and penetrations water is likely to reach this point, and hence materials are selected to be moisture tolerant and integrated with flashing. In some cases a rainscreen wall is called a pressure-equalized rainscreen wall where the ventilation openings are large enough for the air pressure to nearly equalize on both sides of the rain screen, but this name has been criticized as being redundant and is only useful to scientists and engineers.
Interstitial condensation is a type of condensation that may occur within an enclosed wall, roof or floor cavity structure, which can create dampening.
Dropstitch Inflatable Fabric is a textile product composed of two layers of woven fabric connected by threads, referred to as drop yarns or drop stitch threads. When the fabric layers are coated with an airtight material, typically TPU or PVC, the structure becomes inflatable and capable of holding its shape under pressure. The inflated pockets created by the drop yarns provide the fabric with structural rigidity, enabling the creation of flat-sided, pressure-resistant structures.
