| DigitalBlast | |
| Type: | business consultation |
| Industry: | aerospace |
| Fate: | Active |
| Successors: | --> |
| Founded: | December 2018 in Saitama, Saitama, Japan |
| Founder: | Shingo Horiguchi |
| Hq Location City: | Chiyoda, Tokyo |
| Hq Location Country: | Japan |
| Areas Served: | --> |
| Products: | centrifuges |
| Owners: | --> |
DigitalBlast is a Japanese aerospace consulting firm focusing on the space industry in general.[1] It provides guidance to firms seeking to enter the space sector, along with providing support for digital transformation.[2] [3] The company also manages SPACE Media, a news website focusing on private spaceflight.[4]
Project NOAH is a research and development project of DigitalBlast which aims to develop technologies that will realize a self-sustaining environment on the Moon, in anticipation of human habitats being built there in the near future. One goal of the project is to study the effects low-gravity has on plant production. The AMAZ research equipment will be the first step of this project.[5]
AMAZ is a research equipment under development by DigitalBlast that will use centrifugal forces to create artificial gravity equivalent to the lunar surface.[1] AMAZ will be sent to the International Space Station (ISS) and will be used to conduct research on plant growth. Experiments to be conducted by AMAZ include a study on the growth of moss in different gravity environments by Toyama University,[6] and cultivating brewer's yeast in the gravity environment of the Moon and Mars[7] in cooperation with the University of Tokyo and Nara Institute of Science and Technology.[8]
In November 2022, DigitalBlast signed a contract with Axiom Space for placing AMAZ inside the ISS National Lab.[9] [10] Axiom Space will support AMAZ's safety review, along with providing a transport service to orbit and its retrieval. The agreement also left open the possibility of the AMAZ device later being placed inside the Axiom Orbital Segment, a privately operated space station that will be docked to the ISS.[9] The same month, it was announced that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was contracted to design AMAZ's flight model.[11]
In February 2023, DigitalBlast announced plans for a modified version of AMAZ dubbed 'AMAZ Alpha', which will be used for cell culturing.[12]
TAMAKI is a research equipment that will be capable of supplying water to grow plants inside.[5] TAMAKI will be carried inside an uncrewed science satellite complete with a retrieval space capsule being developed by Elevation Space. As of August 2022, TAMAKI was planned to be launched in 2026.[13]