Solar Black: Primitive Charcoal Pigment Protects ESA Solar Orbiter Mission
Wednesday, February 12, 2014 - 12:20
in Astronomy & Space
Sometimes you don't need fancy modern compounds - primitive cavemen had the answer.Burnt bone charcoal, used in prehistoric cave paintings, will be applied to the ESA’s Solar Orbiter titanium heatshield to protect it from the Sun’s close-up glare. Solar Orbiter, due for launch in 2017, will carry instruments to perform high-resolution imaging of Sol from as close as 42,000,000 km – a little more than a quarter of the distance to Earth. Operating in direct view of the Sun, the mission must endure 13 times the intensity of terrestrial sunlight and temperatures rising as high as 520° C. read more