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evilcam [soylentnews.org] writes:

Science Alert has a story on a paper suggesting the use of asteroids for space stations [sciencealert.com].

The basic idea of turning an asteroid into a rotating space habitat has existed for a while. Despite that, it's always seemed relatively far off regarding technologies, so the concept hasn't received much attention over the years.
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David W. Jensen, a retired Technical Fellow at Rockwell Collins ... released a 65-page paper that details an easy-to-understand, relatively inexpensive, and feasible plan to turn an asteroid into a space habitat.
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Dr. Jensen breaks the discussion into three main categories – asteroid selection, habitat style selection, and mission strategy to get there (i.e., what robots to use).
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After a relatively in-depth selection process, Dr. Jensen decided on one in particular as a good candidate – Atira. This S-type asteroid has an entire class of asteroids named after it. Atira comes in at about a 4.8 km diameter and even has its own moon – a 1 km diameter asteroid that orbits it closely.
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He eventually settled on a torus as the ideal habitat type and then dives into calculations about the overall station mass, how to support the inner wall with massive columns, and how to allocate floor space. All important, but how exactly would we build such a massive behemoth?
Self-replicating robots are Dr. Jensen's answer. The report's third section details a plan to utilize spider robots and a base station that can replicate themselves. He stresses the importance of only sending the most advanced technical components from Earth and using materials on the asteroid itself to build everything else, from rock grinders to solar panels.

The numbers seem wildly out to me but I'm not an expert by any stretch. Feels as feasible as living on Mars...

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