NASA official warns private sector: We’re moving on from low-Earth orbit

Re:NASA official warns private sector: We’re moving on from ... by LeifCarrotson on Monday December 07, 2015 @07:11PM (#10693831)

By shielding, do you mean that astronauts could live inside or behind the asteroid, just using its mass between them and the sun? That would be pretty dark and cold. As far as I know, no asteroids have major magnetic fields.

I am totally with you on using the asteroids for materials, but I am not sure that they would provide useful gravity either. Even one of the largest near-earth asteroids, 433 Eros, only has a surface gravity of 0.0059 m/s^2. Is that useful?

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Re:NASA official warns private sector: We’re moving on from ... by stcredzero on Monday December 07, 2015 @07:23PM (#10693914)

By shielding, do you mean that astronauts could live inside or behind the asteroid, just using its mass between them and the sun?

I mean that the habitable modules would be located inside silos embedded within the asteroid, so that the living space would be entirely surrounded by radiation shielding mass.

That would be pretty dark and cold.

The problem in space is generally getting rid of heat. Vacuum is a great insulator, insulation material is effective and relatively cheap, and radiative cooling is fairly slow. The other thermal problem is exposure to direct sunlight. The asteroid as a shell of massive shielding would help in this regard.

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