Shields Up! Cosmic Rays a Problem for Deep House Journey

One of the large challenges with touring to the Moon and past is defending each human our bodies and the electronics that help them in area in opposition to the onslaught of radiation from the solar and the remainder of the universe. 

“NASA has known about this space radiation for 40 years and they’ve been studying the most important parts,” stated Daniel Cebra, professor and chair of the UC Davis Department of Physics and Astronomy. “The part they haven’t studied is high-energy nuclear collisions and that’s how a high-energy nuclear physicist gets involved.” 

Cebra not too long ago mentioned the subject on the  April 2026 Astronomy on Tap occasion at Sudwerk Brewing Co. in Davis. 

Three varieties of radiation

Outside the safety of Earth’s environment and magnetic discipline, there are three varieties of radiation to take care of, Cebra stated: photo voltaic wind, photo voltaic energetic particles and galactic cosmic rays. 

The photo voltaic wind is manufactured from charged particles always boiling off the solar. With energies of 1 to 10 kiloelectron-volts, these particles will not penetrate the partitions of a spaceship. 

Solar energetic particles, given off by photo voltaic flares, are a whole lot of instances extra highly effective and penetrating, however can nonetheless be stopped by a sufficiently thick layer of water. 

The actual downside, although, is from galactic cosmic rays. Given off by exploding stars and different enormously energetic occasions, these cosmic rays can have energies as much as a Giga-electron volt, a billion instances extra highly effective than the photo voltaic wind. They can move by means of a whole lot of meters of defending. 

Studying heavy ion collisions

Any digital units going into outer area persistently bear radiation hardness testing. UC Davis conducts such testing on the Crocker Nuclear Laboratory.

With NASA’s latest return to the moon and its scheduled future missions, Cebra stated the area company is prioritizing high-energy measurements (these within the giga-electron volts vary) as the subsequent space of examine for area radiation shielding. 

Cebra’s analysis group research collisions between heavy ions, akin to gold. They use devices such because the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) on the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory. The outcomes from their experiments can be utilized to simulate how high-energy cosmic rays can have an effect on spacecraft. 

Read more about Cebra’s talk here.