Minimum Viable Population

Group Dynamics

When creating an artificial home away from Earth, one of the main concerns is making sure that the colony is sustainable in terms of population. For the Honeycomb Space Settlement, what we are most interested in is how many people are needed to keep the population on the rise, ensuring the survival of the human species.

The two most important aspects of a viable population are maintaining genetic diversity and making sure that most of the inhabitants can survive potential disasters (earthquakes, volcano eruptions etc. on Earth, explosions, system malfunctions, and collisions with asteroids in space).

When it comes to genetic diversity, estimates of the minimum viable population vary between 15 0 (John Moore, 2002) and 4 0 ,0 0 0 (Gardner-O'Kearnym, 2014). Although social engineering can probably bring these numbers, 40,000 is still too much for our small colony. Therefore, simply relying on the colonists to perpetuate the species is not enough. One solution is using in v itr o fe r tiliz atio n using frozen genetic material acquired from people on Earth before launch. This would accelerate the population growth, effectively solving any issues related to gene diversity and is easily achieved with today’s technology. As soon as the population reaches the correct number, in vitro fertilization can be abandoned and reproduction can carry on naturally.

The use of genetic engineering means that the settlement can start with as few as 8 01 0 0 people on board and still survive for many generations. Assuming a rate of growth of 0 .0 1 2 (1.2%, slightly larger than the one on Earth)[5], the population will be reaching the required 40,000 in a little over 500 years. By the 1545th year, the population will have reached 10 billion people (assuming constant growth which should never happen in real life – the growth is most likely to slow down with time, as seen on Earth).

Year 0 50 100 500 1000 1250 1545 Population

100 181 329 38,927 15,153,484 298,978,961 10,090,015,150

Fig 2.1 Population growth assuming r=1.2% and initial population of 100

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Fig 2.2 Variation in a Gene Gardner-O'Kearnym, 2014

The second issue at hand is protecting the general population from accidents and catastrophes. In case of fire, explosions, meteor showers, system malfunction or any other issue, the number one priority is making sure the settlement survives with as few casualties as possible. Fortunately, the design of the Honeycomb Space Settlement is characteristically safe. When disaster strikes, having 1 0 .0 0 0 people all packed together in a small place can be devastating. However, our colony’s modular design lets us split people into groups of n o m o r e t h an 1 0 0 in h a b itan ts, creating neighborhood-like communities all across the settlement. This means that, in case of an emergency, the number of injured people will be kept down to a minimum, preventing the population from suffering too much of an impact as a whole.

One other factor which might influence the minimum population aboard the settlement is how people are going to interact with each other once in space. Living with the same twenty other individuals for eighty years can certainly change many aspects of a modern citizen’s life. To better understand this issue, we can take a look and analyze modern real-life villages from all around the globe. India, for example, has 2 3 6 ,0 0 4 v illag e s with a population fe w e r th an 5 0 0, while many east-European countries have villages with fewer than 1 0 0 people living in them [2]. Therefore, one can assume that 8 0-1 0 0 is the lower bound of a human settlement.

In a settlement where everybody knows everybody, however, life can prove difficult at times. The lack of privacy and secrecy can be frustrating, while fights over unimportant matters can often ruin the mood across the entire spacecraft. We believe that as the colony grows, the entire dynamic of the groups aboard will follow the change, slowly evolving towards what we see on Earth. People will be able to choose their friends instead of being forced to live with someone they do not like and relationships will start playing a more important role in everyday life. As studies have shown, individuals tend to change their behavior in order to fit into a group. Moreover, research done on American and Russian astronauts aboard the ISS shows that life in space can have severe psychological and behavioral effects, such as depression, suicidal thoughts, psychotic thinking caused by stress, communication misunderstandings, changes in attitude and negative emotions towards other people. One way of reducing such problems is keeping everyone on board involved in teambuilding exercises, joint celebrations and cooperative activities.