Nanocomposite ablative materials for thermal shields of re-entry vehicles

Carbon-phenolic ablative heat shields represent an effective solution for the thermal protection of reentry spacecraft and they are typically composed by a porous carbon preform partially filled by phenolic resin. In this work carbon-phenolic materials modified by different amounts of ceramic nanoparticles were manufactured and investigated and the performaces of the obtained nanocomposite ablators were assessed in terms of thermal protection and ablation resistance.

Giovanni Pulci is an Associate Professor in Materials Science and Technology at the Dept. of Chemical Engineering, Materials, Environment (DICMA) of Sapienza University of Rome. His research has been focused since 2004 on the fields of surface engineering and thermal protection systems, and specifically on coatings and materials for high temperature applications (ablative thermal protections and thermal barrier coatings).