Weekly Space Hangout: April 1, 2020 – Dr. Robert B. Hayes and Radiation Shielding in Space

Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain)

Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier )

Pam Hoffman (EverydaySpacer.com / @EverydaySpacer)

Michael Rodruck (@michaelrodruck)

Announcements:

This week we are airing Fraser’s prerecorded interview with Dr. Robert B. Hayes, Associate Professor of Nuclear Engineering at North Carolina State University. Dr. Hayes is co-author of a recent paper published January 7.

2020, in the journal Radiation Physics and Chemistry announcing the development of a new cost-effective technique for shielding military and space exploration electronics from the effects of ionizing radiation. According to Dr. Hayes, their approach “can be used to maintain the same level of radiation shielding and reduce the weight by 30% or more, or you could maintain the same weight and improve shielding by 30% or more – compared to the most widely used shielding techniques. Either way, our approach reduces the volume of space taken up by shielding.”

Dr. Hayes is a Certified Health Physicist and a licensed Professional Engineer (nuclear) with industry and field experience in radiological emergency response, nuclear waste management, nuclear safety, radiation dosimetry, nuclear criticality safety, air monitoring, ALARA and shielding design.

His research interests include nuclear nonproliferation, radiological emergency response and nuclear waste disposal technologies which are advanced using novel hybrid approaches including radiation detection, air monitoring, luminescence and magnetic resonance coupled with Monte Carlo radiation transport modeling.

To read the complete February 12, 2020, press release from NC State visit https://news.ncsu.edu/2020/02/smaller-lighter-radiation-shielding/

To learn more about Rob, visit https://www.ne.ncsu.edu/people/rbhayes/

The Weekly Space Hangout is a production of CosmoQuest.

Want to support CosmoQuest? Here are specific ways you can help:

• Subscribe FREE to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/cosmoquest
• Watch our streams over on Twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/cosmoquestx – follow and subscribe!
• Become a Patreon of Astronomy Cast https://www.patreon.com/astronomycast
• Become a Patreon of CosmoQuest https://www.patreon.com/cosmoquestx
• Sponsor 365 Days of Astronomy http://bit.ly/sponsor365DoA

If you would like to join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew, visit their site here and sign up. They’re a great team who can help you join our online discussions!

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Wednesday at 5:00 pm Pacific / 8:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today, or the Weekly Space Hangout YouTube page – Please subscribe!

Podcast (wshaudio): Download (Duration: 57:40 — 42.0MB)

Subscribe: RSS

Podcast (wshvideo): Download (Duration: 1:03:24 — 497.6MB)

Subscribe: RSS