NASA Turns Astronaut Trash Into Space Radiation Shield

[Buster's Uncle]

NASA Turns Astronaut Trash Into Space Radiation Shield
By Megan Gannon, News Editor | SPACE.com – 6 hrs ago.. .

 
Humans produce trash just about everywhere they go, including space, which will pose a problem for astronauts on long voyages to other planets. But scientists have found a way to transform this space detritus into something useful: a radiation shield.
 
Since flinging garbage out the door is not an option, engineers at NASA are testing how a novel on-board trash compactor could give new life to discarded water bottles, clothing scraps, duct tape and other waste on deep-space missions.
 
The space trash compactor is not like the giant one on the Death Star that nearly squashed Luke Skywalker and the gang in the first "Star Wars" film. This one is smaller, producing circular tiles of trash 8 inches (20 centimeters) wide and a half-inch (1.3 cm) from a single day's worth of garbage. The discs then could be stowed away, or even used for radiation shielding to protect a spacecraft’s crew, NASA officials said.
 
"One of the ways these discs could be re-used is as a radiation shield because there's a lot of plastic packaging in the trash," Mary Hummerick, a Qinetiq North America microbiologist at Kennedy Space Center in Florida working on the project, said in a statement. "The idea is to make these tiles, and, if the plastic components are high enough, they could actually shield radiation."
 
Beyond low-Earth orbit, astronauts are bombarded with harmful cosmic rays, which can boost the risk of certain diseases like cancer and neurological damage. And the longer one spends in space, the greater the risk. The dangers radiation are especially of concern given NASA’s plans for a manned mission to an asteroid by 2025, and then on to Mars by the mid 2030s — the round trip to the Red Planet alone could take at least two years.
 
Trash tiles could, for example, bolster the space radiation shielding around the astronauts' sleeping quarters or perhaps a small area in the spacecraft that would be built up to serve as a storm shelter to protect crews from solar flare effects, NASA officials said.
 


Devised by engineers at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California, the compactor heats the trash for 3.5 hours to between 300 and 350 degrees Fahrenheit (148 and 176 degrees Celsius), melting the garbage, but not incinerating it. The process reduces the trash by at least 10 times the original size and squeezes out water that could be recycled.
 
Hummerick said strips containing bacterial spores are being embedded in test tiles to see if the heating and compaction process is effective in killing bacteria. Her team at Kennedy is expecting to get back a new batch of compacted tiles from Ames soon and will next test if the discs remain sterile in long-term storage.
 
"They are achieving sterilization for the most part," Hummerick said. "What we don't know is, can a few possible surviving bacteria go inert and then grow back?"
 
NASA mission planners need to think about how to handle trash to make use of limited resources during long journeys and to prevent spacecraft from becoming filled with garbage. Trashed tossed out of a spaceship could potentially threaten to contaminate other worlds, and NASA policy dictates that such pollution should be avoided.

http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-turns-astronaut-trash-space-radiation-shield-093357084.html

[Unorthodox]

More proof there's nothing duct tape cannot do. 

[Buster's Uncle]

Might be useful to plate inflatable modules with...

[Unorthodox]

I'm fairly certain the modules come with at least some level of rad shielding in the fabric itself, actually.  Possibly even better than the ISS components already up there. 

[Buster's Uncle]

I would hope so, but how likely do you really think that is?  Doesn't rad shielding require mass and density above all else?  How could they manage a fabric that shields better than plate metal?  How much does a square foot of the stuff weigh?

[Unorthodox]

Um...

Here's the only official thing I can find, and it's old.  Let's leave it at that. 

http://www.nasa.gov/vision/space/travelinginspace/radiation_shielding.html


Here's a commercial company making a fabric shield.

http://www.radshield.com/

Demron is a radiation-blocking fabric made by Radiation Shield Technologies. The material has radiation protection similar to lead shielding, while being lightweight and flexible. The composition of Demron is proprietary, but is described as a non-toxic polymer.

Demron shields the wearer from radiation alone, it can be coupled with different protective materials to block chemical and biological threats as well.

Demron is roughly three to four times more expensive than a conventional lead apron, but can be treated like a normal fabric for cleaning, storage and disposal.

More recent uses for Demron include certified first responder hazmat suits as well as tactical vests. Demron is proven by the United States Department of Energy to significantly reduce high energy alpha and beta radiation, and reduce low energy gamma radiation. When several sheets of Demron are laminated together the result is a much more powerful shield, though Demron cannot completely block all gamma radiation.

Supposedly they sent suits to clean up in Japan for free.

Hazmat Suits make it to Japan Disaster Relief donated by Radshield - safety suits

[Buster's Uncle]

Hmm.  I'm not convinced.

What harm would there be in plating the outside of the ISS in dried astronaut poop, anyways?  They can always use more shielding...

[Unorthodox]

Absolutely, just saying some of the existing compartments might need it more urgently.  My question on this trash compactor is the energy consumption.  Usually heating things for 3 hours takes a fair bit of energy. 

[Buster's Uncle]

They ought to be able to take care of that with a big lens outside a window, and you just know they didn't.