NASA/SDIO Space Environmental Effects on Materials Workshop, Part 1

Book excerpt: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO) cosponsored a workshop on Space Environmental Effects on Materials at the NASA Langley Research Center from June 28 to July 1, 1988. The joint workshop was designed to inform participants of the present state of knowledge regarding space environmental effects on materials and to identify knowledge gaps that prevent informed decisions on the best use of advanced materials in space for long-duration NASA and SDIO missions. Establishing priorities for future ground-based and space-based materials research was a major goal of the workshop. The end product of the workshop was an assessment of the current state-of-the-art in space environmental effects on materials in order to develop a national plan for spaceflight experiments. The workshop was intended for participation by expert applied researchers, systems technologists, and program managers for spacecraft systems.