Development of a Model for Control of the NASA CELSS Crop Growth Research Chamber

In support of development of bioregenerative life support systems for space habitats, a chamber for conducting research on the biophysical response of crop plants in controlled environments is being designed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The imprecision of mathematical descriptions of the behavior of biological systems led to the development of a model which can be used to derive a strategy for control of the chamber environment which is robust to the system uncertainties. The modeling approach and observations of the characteristics of the model are described.