Investigation of Lithium Metal Hydride Materials for Mitigation of Deep Space Radiation

Date

2016-07-10

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Volume Title

Publisher

46th International Conference on Environmental Systems

Abstract

Radiation exposure to crew, electronics, and non-metallic materials is one of many concerns with long-term, deep space travel. Mitigating this exposure is approached via a multi-faceted methodology focusing on multi-functional materials, vehicle configuration, and operational or mission constraints. In this set of research, we are focusing on new multi-functional materials that may have advantages over traditional shielding materials, such as polyethylene. Metal hydride materials are of particular interest for deep space radiation shielding due to their ability to store hydrogen, a low-Z material known to be an excellent radiation mitigator and a potential fuel source. We have previously investigated 41 different metal hydrides for their radiation mitigation potential. , Of these metal hydrides, we found a set of lithium hydrides to be of particular interest due to their excellent shielding of galactic cosmic radiation. Given these results, we will continue our investigation of lithium hydrides by expanding our data set to include dose equivalent and to further understand why these materials outperformed polyethylene in a heavy ion environment. For this study, we used HZETRN2010, a one-dimensional transport code developed by NASA Langley Research Center, to simulate radiation transport through the lithium hydrides. We focused on the 1977 solar minimum Galactic Cosmic Ray environment and thicknesses of 1, 5, 10, 20, 30, 50, and 100 g/cm2 to stay consistent with our previous studies. The details of this work and the subsequent results will be discussed in this paper.

Description

United States
NASA JSC
The Boeing Company
503
ICES503: Radiation Issues for Space Flight
Vienna, Austria
Kristina Rojdev, NASA – Johnson Space Center, USA
William Atwell, Retired Boeing Technical Fellow, USA
The 46th International Conference on Environmental Systems was held in Vienna, Austria, USA on 10 July 2016 through 14 July 2016.

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Keywords

galactic cosmic radiation, radiation shielding, metal hydride, lithium hydride, dose equivalent

Citation