Space Exposed Hardware
JSC curates a variety of spacecraft and spacecraft components. These include the Genesis and Stardust sample return capsules and pieces of Surveyor III, the Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF), the Solar Maximum satellite, and the European Recoverable Carrier (EuReCa).
Stardust sample return capsule after landing.
The space environment varies widely throughout our solar system. The collection of space-exposed hardware curated at JSC represents a number of these unique environments including the Lunar surface (Surveyor III); the Earth-Sun Lagrangian (L1) point (Genesis), the 7 year journey of Stardust outside of Earth-orbit; and low Earth orbit (LDEF, the Solar Maximum satellite, and EuReCa). The Genesis and Stardust spacecraft are also witnesses to the direct environment of Earth entry, while the remainder of the collection returned to Earth safely in various spacecraft.
Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) being retrieved by Space Shuttle after 5.7 years in orbit.
The diversity of the current space-exposed hardware collections offers the opportunity to study a variety environmental effects including micrometeoroid impacts, UV exposure, atmospheric oxygen erosion, radiation effects, contamination issues, charging effects, etc. The collections include components that can be evaluated for physical, thermal, electrical, and mechanical performance. Not only can these effects be evaluated for a single environment, but comparative studies can be performed to gain deeper insight into the cause and effect of space environmental exposure.