It is an environmentally closed facility where occupants can simulate a long-duration self-contained mission with no outside inputs other than power/energy.
The lab was designed by Liu Hong of the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (BUAA).
The lab is a type of bioregenerative life support system (BLSS), the third built in the world and the first in China.
The one man, Dong Chen, and two women, Xie Beizhen and Wang Minjuan, volunteers from the BUAA, conducted the first long-duration research project of this kind in China, 3 February to 20 May 2014.
The mealworms, composed of 3/4 protein, were chosen due to a United Nations study recommending them as a food source for the poor and undernourished; however, it was met with resistance from Western astronauts.