Aerogel [Nasa]

by limbic on March 29, 2004


Nearly as light as air solid which does not conduct heat well (i.e can be a heat shield).

Aerogel is a solid, but it is 99.8% empty space. In fact, it very closely approaches the density of air. It practically IS air. It’s still a solid, though, and you can even pick it up or set things on it.

Since it’s very porous, if you throw something at it, it will bury itself within the material.

This substance was recently used aboard the Stardust spacecraft, which flew through through the trail of a comet and collected dust particles. Since the dust in the comet’s trail was traveling at about 6 times the speed of a rifle bullet, the only way to collect them without altering their shape or destroying them was to use this substance. As an added benefit, objects embedded in the substance leave that nice little trail, so no matter how small the particle is, it’ll still be pretty easy to find and retrieve. And also, it doesn’t conduct heat very well…

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