| タイトル | Production of Bulk and Fiber Glass in Space |
| 著者（英） | Whitaker, Ann F.; Tucker, Dennis S. |
| 著者所属（英） | NASA Marshall Space Flight Center |
| 発行日 | 2001-01-10 |
| 言語 | eng |
| 内容記述 | The production of bulk glass and fiber glass in space and on the moon and Mars should lead to superior products. Specifically glass plates for windows and optical elements could be produced with theoretical strengths by production in vacuum. Water vapor is known to decrease glass strength by up to two orders of magnitude from theoretical. A low gravity glass plate apparatus prototype has been designed and built which uses centrifugal force to shape the glass and solar energy to melt the glass. Glass fiber could be produced on the moon or Mars from in-situ materials using standard technologies. This material could then be used as reinforcement in composite materials in construction of bases. Also, it has been shown that processing in reduced gravity suppresses crystallization in certain heavy metal fluoride glasses. It is proposed to reprocess optical fiber preforms on the space station and then pull these into optical fiber. It is estimated that the attenuation coefficient should be reduced by two orders of magnitude. |
| NASA分類 | Space Processing |
| 権利 | No Copyright |
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