Posted on 05/02/2017 9:27:07 AM PDT by BenLurkin
As the son of a fashion designer in Spain, Casillas grew up around fabrics and textiles, and was intrigued by how they are used for the sake of design. Much in the same way that textiles are produced by weaving together countless threads, Casilla’s prototype space fabric relies on 3-D printing to create metal squares in one piece, which are then strung together to form a coat of armor.
In addition to his work with this new space fabric, Casillas co-leads JPL’s Atelier workshop, which specialized in the rapid-prototyping of advanced concepts and systems. This fast-paced collaborative environment works with different technologies and looks for ways to incorporate new ones (such as 4-D printing) into existing designs. As Casillas described this concept in a NASA press release:
“We call it ‘4-D printing’ because we can print both the geometry and the function of these materials. If 20th Century manufacturing was driven by mass production, then this is the mass production of functions.”
The space fabrics have four essential functions, which includes reflectivity, passive heat management, foldability and tensile strength. With one side reflecting light and the other absorbing it, the material acts as a means of thermal control. It can also fold in many different ways and adapt to shapes, all the while maintaining tensile strength to ensure it can sustain forces pulling on it.
These fabrics could be used to protect astronauts and shield large antennas, deployable devices and spacecraft from meteorites and other hazards. In addition, they could be used to ensure that missions to extreme environments would be protected from the elements. Consider Jupiter’s moon Europa, which NASA is planning on exploring in the coming decade using a lander – aka. the Europa Clipper mission.
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
They forgot atmospheric retention as an essential function of space fabric.
If you pried each square as part, each piece could be used to build a computer keyboard.
Could come in handy in case Greedo shoots first.
All you need is a magnetized hand grenade to counter this idea. Kinda along the lines of those old WW2 magnetized mines they had for ships/subs.
Yes....but will it protect against Space Herpes?
Sounds like a bad idea to me.....LOL
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.