• Control
• Humidity System
• ISS
• Space

Cultivating higher plants in terms of dimensions and number, plays a fundamental role when dealing with life in space. Indeed the possibility to have a completely independent and biological life-support system, is one of the most interesting perspective studied at the moment. It could contribute to all most important factors in human lives such as food production, carbonic dioxide reduction, oxygen management etc. Since the first launch in space with plants onboard there have been several improvements in terms of management, growth analysis, suitable systems design and so on. The purpose of this master thesis is to analyse the various alternatives to best control the plant environment, focusing particularly on the humidity problem that is a fundamental task when dealing with biological experiments, together with illumination and temperature control. The thesis will firstly show a general investigation of all possible devices that could be used for the objective of the mission, narrowing then the analysis on those instruments that could comply with the strict requirements that are proper of a space application, especially onboard the International Space Station. Then the paper will move on the detailed study of the choice that will be made, presenting an innovative solution that could be the new frontier of this kind of control systems for future applications. It is not an outcome of the trade off between all the presented architectures, as usual trying to maximize performances, reducing masses and costs. The general scheme of the device will be analysed and studied in details with an already existing model, whose validation has been accurately experimentally performed by the authors of the model itself. The analysis will then proceed showing also the results of the model applied to the possible system that will be used to host the biological experiment on the ISS. Finally a rough prototype design will be presented and experimented taking advantage of Kayser Italia instruments, considering as reference model a NASA device (already onboard the International Space System); moreover a primitive design of the control system, which would include the hygrometers, possible moving parts, thermometers and a suitable feedback control circuit will be developed and shown to permita validation.