Space debris is a problem for many reasons. One of them is a piece of debris hitting a satellite and destroying it or affecting its functioning. Another is the generation of the dreaded Kessler syndrome, in which a piece of space debris can spawn more pieces upon impact, causing a dangerous domino effect. There are shields that protect the satellites from the impact of scrap metal, but the process creates more fragments, which increases the second error. For this reason, the startup has developed the Atomic-6 Space Armor, an armor designed to end both problems simultaneously.
A prototype in space. Atomic-6 has sent its first space armor prototype aboard the Portal Space System’s Starburst-1 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The company’s engineers hope that it will receive some impact from this tiny fragment while in space, so they can detect via telemetry how the shield behaves.
big problem. Large pieces of space debris can be detected, so collisions with them are preventable. However, most of these scraps are very small and difficult to trace. According to an ESA estimate, there are more than 65,000 objects larger than 10 cm in space, about 1.5 million between 1 and 10 cm, and about 230 million between 1 mm and 1 cm. These are statistics that are growing rapidly.
These small fragments are very dangerous, but not only because they cannot be detected, but because of the effect they create. For example, a 3 mm aluminum sphere at 7 km/s concentrates about 0.93 kJ of energy, comparable to a powerful handgun bullet. This is enough to damage a satellite.
Background. In 1946, astronomer Fred Whipple invented the Whipple Shield to protect spacecraft from potential impacts generated at high speeds. Space debris wasn’t much of a problem at the time, but micrometeorites could damage ships.
Roughly speaking, his shield is made up of two thin walls separated by a gap. When an object violently hits the outer wall, it and the object itself shatter, melt, and partially vaporize. As a result, a cloud of tiny, warm particles is formed, which moves across the gap to the second wall. The energy previously concentrated in a single block dissipates into that cloud, so the second wall holds it without problem and the ship is safe. These shields are still used today, but they have two problems: they are too heavy and produce more small fragments, since they do not fit into the cavity between the two walls. The latter, logically, can exacerbate Kessler’s syndrome.
Atomic 6 solution. The composition of the space armor is a company secret, but at least it is known to consist of fibers in a resin matrix. This gives it much more lightness. So much so that the light versions made so far are 30% lighter and 15% thinner than the aluminum Whipple Shield. In laboratory tests, this armor has been able to absorb and sustain impacts at speeds in excess of 25,700 km/h without further fragmentation. Additionally, the shield is radio frequency transparent, so it does not interfere with satellite activity. All benefits.
If the tests go well, the Nuclear 6’s next goal will be to deploy its new armor on a larger scale. But for this you have to go step by step. First, it has to show that it works in space just as well as it does in laboratories on Earth.
Cover image Atomic 6
In Xataka | SpaceX has made sending things into space very cheap. The problem is that now the space is full of things
