Abstract:
Dental Composites to Degraded MLI:
Ben Reed's experience as a materials engineer has led him from the challenges of dental composites to long term space exposure on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST).
Dental composites were developed in the 1960s and have continued to play a major role in restorative dentistry to date. However, they do not exhibit the typical service life of silver amalgam or gold fillings. Much of their lower service life is due to the consequences of polymerization shrinkage.
The Hubble Space Telescope has faced challenges with materials including a failed power converter on the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) Instrument, several failed flex leads from returned-from-orbit HST gyros, and the continuing degradation of the on-orbit multi-layered insulation (MLI) encasing HST. Following the presentation, a 5 1/2 square foot section of MLI returned after 1 billion miles on orbit on the HST will be displayed.
In this presentation, Mr. Reed will summarize the materials' challenges with dental composites and discuss three Hubble Space Telescope materials 'failures' and the recovery therefrom.
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