Magnetic shield for spacefarers

[Notebook]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7706844.stm

"There're a lot of things to work out, like control, reliability, weight to launch, and so on," said Dr Bamford. "I don't think it'll come down to as little as sticking fridge magnets on the outside of the spacecraft."

Thats spooky, I have fridge magnets on the outside of my car, and they work fine.

N.

 

[Andy44]

I asked my college professor once why we didn't just stick an electromagnet on space vehicles to protect them and he said, I don't know, maybe that would work."

Of course, there are consequences to being in close proximity to powerful magnets, as any MRI technician will tell you.

 

[Zatnikitelman]

Not to mention that we haven't needed them. Has any manned space vehicle been significantly affected by an orbital debris strike? That could have been deflected by a magnetic field?

 

[Lunar_Lander]

That was included in the BBC Space Odyssey movie, to protect the Pegasus during the flyby at the sun and the stay at Jupiter. The EVA suit for Io also had a magnetic shield.

But somewhere at the M6 board it had been said that that aurora effect which was used in the film to show the active magnetic field wouldn't appear in reality.

 

[thomasantony]

Not to mention that we haven't needed them. Has any manned space vehicle been significantly affected by an orbital debris strike? That could have been deflected by a magnetic field?

Its not the debris thats meant to be deflected. Its the high energy charged particles ( mostly protons ) coming from the Sun and elsewhere in the galaxy ( cosmic rays) that are to be deflected.

 

[Andy44]

And the reason we haven't needed the shield yet is because most manned flights never leave LEO, and Apollo didn't spend much time outside of LEO. BTW, the Moon has a very very weak magnetic field, so it provided no protection. Apollo missions were a calculated risk that no big solar flares would come their way. Any mission that spends lots of time beyond LEO will need to provide some sort of protection from charged particles.

 

[TSPenguin]

That is something I always found odd about mars direct and similar projects.
Does someone know what their comments on radiation were?

 

[thomasantony]

They were supposed to have a shelter in the center of their modules. They would retreat into it at times of Solar flares and such.

 

[Cairan]

One issue I have with radiation shielding for long term deep space environment exposure is that you need to haul around a huge combination of materials to shield properly. As anyone familiar with radiation will tell, charged particules are only one side of the equation. You need to account for high energy photons (x-ray and gamma ray) as well, and make sure that you arrange the materials to prevent "cascades" of radiation of one type to another by interactions of the shielding.

Simply put: a giant magnet, a bubble of water or a thick lead balloon just won't cut it simply for everything. There's going to be a lot of work in designing "shelter space" by taking into account ALL vectors of incoming radiation, of all types.

Materials end up being arranged in a sandwich... My guess is that's what they did with this material: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demron . Probably doped the fabric with boron and god knows what in sandwiched layers...

 

[HiPotOk1978]

I've been flying around the solar system in Dan's DGIV with no loss of Ummu's to radiation... maybe we need to give the space agencies Dan's telephone # and have them ask him how he did it

 

[unknown_orbiter]

Magnets = weight and magnets = screwed up instrumentation
These are two big issues to over come. The most logical idea is to have a large magnet in the center of the ship. The magnetism is directed safely through conducts to the hull, where it is then dispersed around the ship.

 

[thomasantony]

Magnets = weight and magnets = screwed up instrumentation
These are two big issues to over come. The most logical idea is to have a large magnet in the center of the ship. The magnetism is directed safely through conducts to the hull, where it is then dispersed around the ship.

You don't need to have magnetic fields inside the ship. Only surrounding it. and this is a first step towards shielding, the the final answer.

 

[unknown_orbiter]

That isn't what I said. I said have a magnet on the inside that with conducts that divert the magnetic field to the outside of the ship.