The atmospheric environment at low earth orbit (LEO) poses a serious threat to long term space hardware such as Space Station. This is due to the fact that the atmospheric constituents at LEO are considerably different than at the earth's surface. The most abundant species at the proposed Space Station altitude (between 300 and 500 km) is atomic oxygen. Effects of atomic oxygen have been observed for various space materials during shuttle flights. Briefly, these indicate that carbonous compounds are extremely etchable by atomic oxygen. Some metals appear to be unaffected, while others form oxides. Number density levels of atomic oxygen at the nominal altitude range for Space Station combined with the orbital speed of a about 8 km/sec yield a flux of 1013 - 1015 ground state atoms/cm2/s depending on altitude, attitude of vehicle, and solar conditions. Furthermore, the orbital speed of the Space Station results in an effective speed of 5 electron volt atoms incident upon a stationary spacecraft. What is therefore needed is an atomic beam facility with the above specifications to test candidate space material types, and study LEO environmental effects in the laboratory.
Low earth orbit environment simulator using ion laser photodetachment scheme
Simulator fuer den unteren Erdorbit mit IOnen-Laser-Photoabloesungsverfahren
1987
4 Seiten, 2 Bilder, 3 Quellen
Conference paper
English
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