HR: 0800h
AN: NG21B-0527    [Abstracts]
TI: Initial Experimental Results of a Laboratory Mini-Magnetosphere for Astronaut Protection
AU: * Bamford, R A
EM: r.a.bamford@rl.ac.uk
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AU: Bingham, R
EM: r.bingham@rl.ac.uk
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AU: Gibson, K
EM: kieran.gibson@manchester.ac.uk
AF: University of Manchester, Sackville Street Building, Manchester, M60 1QD, United Kingdom
AU: Thornton, A
EM: Anthony.Thornton@manchester.ac.uk
AF: University of Manchester, Sackville Street Building, Manchester, M60 1QD, United Kingdom
AU: Bradford, J
EM: j.bradford@rl.ac.uk
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AU: Hapgood, M
EM: m.a.hapgood@rl.ac.uk
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AU: Gargate, L
EM: luisgargate@cfp.ist.utl.pt
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AU: Gargate, L
EM: luisgargate@cfp.ist.utl.pt
AF: Centro de Física dos Plasmas, Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisboa, 1049-001, Portugal
AU: Silva, L
EM: luis.silva@ist.utl.pt
AF: Centro de Física dos Plasmas, Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisboa, 1049-001, Portugal
AU: Norberg, C
EM: carol@irf.se
AF: Umea University, Box 812, Kiruna, 981 28, Sweden
AU: Todd, T
EM: Tom.Todd@jet.uk
AF: EFDA-JET, Culham Science Centre, Abingdon, OX14 3DB, United Kingdom
AU: Wilson, H
EM: hw508@york.ac.uk
AF: University of York, Heslington, Heslington, YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
AU: Stamper, R
EM: r.stamper@rl.ac.uk
AF: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
AB: Radiation is a major scientific and technological challenge for manned missions to Mars. With an interplanetary flight time of months to years there is a high probability of Solar Energetic Particle events during the flight. Radiation damage to human tissue could result in acute sickness or death of the occupants of an unprotected spacecraft. Thus there is much interest in techniques to mitigate the effects of these events and of the exposure to cosmic rays. The experimental and modelling work presented here concerns one of several innovative "Active Shield" solutions being proposed [1]. The idea of generating an artificial magnetosphere to recreate the protective shield of the Earth's magnetic field for space craft travelling to the Moon or Mars was considered seriously in the 1960's during the Apollo era. With most of the space agencies around the world setting their sights returning to the Moon and then on to Mars, the idea of some sort of active field solution is experiencing a resurgence. Results from the laboratory experiment to determine the effectiveness of a mini-magnetosphere barrier to be able to expel a flowing energetic "solar wind" plasma will be presented. This is compared to a 3D hybrid simulation code that has been successfully compared to other astrophysical situations e.g. AMPTE artificial comet releases [2]. The experiment and modelling comparisons will demonstrate the scalability between the laboratory and astrophysical scale. [1] Adams, J.H. et al., "Revolutionary Concepts of Radiation Shielding for Human Exploration of Space", NASA/TM- 2005-213688, March 2005. [2] Gargate, L.; Bingham, R.; Fonseca, R. A.; Silva, L. O., "dHybrid: A massively parallel code for hybrid simulations of space plasmas", Computer Physics Communications, Volume 176, Issue 6, Pages 419-425, 15 March 2007, doi:10.1016/j.cpc.2006.11.013
DE: 2479 Solar radiation and cosmic ray effects
SC: Nonlinear Geophysics [NG]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting