Magnetic heat shield for reentry

Cool. No pun intended. [Link]

European researchers developing a magnetic heat shield that could augment or replace the traditional ablative materials hope to make a test flight in the next decade.

Under development by EADS Astrium, with support from German aerospace centre DLR and the European Space Agency, the magnetic field-protected vehicle will be launched from a submarine on a suborbital trajectory to land in the Russian Kamchatka region.

As a capsule re-enters the atmosphere the air heats up around it due to friction and usually a high-temperature-resistant material is needed to absorb that. A magnetic field is able to deflect the hot atmospheric air away from the vehicle's surface, reducing or eliminating the need for a heat-absorbing material.

A super-conducting coil will generate the magnetic field that would extend out beyond the leading edge of the vehicle. Assessment of the coil is ongoing.