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Suggested Citation:"B Statement of Task." National Research Council. 2006. Space Radiation Hazards and the Vision for Space Exploration: Report of a Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11760.
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B
Statement of Task

An ad hoc committee of the Space Studies Board will sponsor a cross-disciplinary workshop on the radiation environments in the inner solar system (1-1.5 AU) and their effects on astronauts and operational systems in space. The workshop will consist of overview talks and group discussions in the following areas:

  • Characterization of the heliospheric radiation environment as understood to date, including required data sources;

  • Physical mechanisms of energetic particle acceleration and transport in the heliosphere as understood to date;

  • Radiation health hazards to astronauts;

  • Radiation effects on materials and spacecraft systems; and

  • Mitigation techniques and strategies, including forecasting and operational schemes.

The workshop will bring together experts from a variety of disciplines to identify open questions that will determine the direction of future research on the above topics. Participants will consider in particular the extent that questions in the areas above can be answered by the focused application of current understanding in the relevant physical, biological, and technological fields, and the extent to which basic research will be required to provide the requisite answers. The workshop will concentrate not only on application of current knowledge, but on the basic research into fundamental physical processes that will be necessary for mitigation of the hazards posed by the radiation environment in which manned expeditions to the Moon and Mars will take place. Given the interdisciplinary nature of the workshop, care will be taken to ensure that the highly specialized topics are presented on a level that will be understandable and useful to the members of the various research communities represented at the workshop.

A report of the workshop will be prepared by this organizing committee.

Suggested Citation:"B Statement of Task." National Research Council. 2006. Space Radiation Hazards and the Vision for Space Exploration: Report of a Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11760.
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Fulfilling the President’s Vision for Space Exploration (VSE) will require overcoming many challenges. Among these are the hazards of space radiation to crews traveling to the Moon and Mars. To explore these challenges in some depth and to examine ways to marshal research efforts to address them, NASA, NSF, and the NRC sponsored a workshop bringing together members of the space and planetary science, radiation physics, operations, and exploration engineering communities. The goals of the workshop were to increase understanding of the solar and space physics in the environment of Earth, the Moon, and Mars; to identify compelling relevant research goals; and discuss directions this research should take over the coming decade. This workshop report presents a discussion of radiation risks for the VSE, an assessment of specifying and predicting the space radiation environment, an analysis of operational strategies for space weather support, and a summary and conclusions of the workshop.

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