Responsible Nanotechnology Photo Album

How Aerogel captures 'Stardust'

2006-01-20T12:00:28Z

"The aerogel aboard the Stardust Spacecraft is fitted into a "tennis racket" shaped collector. This is unfolded from the protective Sample Return Capsule to expose it to space during flight. One side of the collector will be faced towards the particles in Comet Wild 2, while the reverse, or B side, will be turned to face the streams of interstellar dust encountered during its journey. When hypervelocity particles are captured in aerogel they produce narrow cone-shaped tracks that are hollow, and can easily be seen in the highly transparent aerogel by using a stereomicroscope. This cone is largest at the point of entry, and the particle is held intact at the point of the cone. This provides a method for determining which direction the dust came from, and is the basis of the approach of using single slabs of aerogel to collect both cometary and interstellar dust from both sides. After the encounter with Comet Wild 2, the aerogel collector will be retracted into the Sample Return Capsule (SRC) and returned to Earth for detailed analysis by scientists at the NASAs Johnson Space Center." - from http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stardust/mission/aerogel-index.html

Nano in action: NASA's Aerogel

2006-01-20T11:53:24Z

"To collect particles without damaging them, Stardust uses an extraordinary substance called aerogel. This is a silicon-based solid with a porous, sponge-like structure in which 99.8 percent of the volume is empty space. By comparison, aerogel is 1,000 times less dense than glass, which is another silicon-based solid. When a particle hits the aerogel, it buries itself in the material, creating a carrot-shaped track up to 200 times its own length. This slows it down and brings the sample to a relatively gradual stop. Since aerogel is mostly transparent - with a distinctive smoky blue cast - scientists will use these tracks to find the tiny particles." - from www.nasa.gov/mission_pag...l-index.html

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2004-12-15T15:52:27Z