Spacecraft Heat Shields Could Violently "Burst" When Plunging Into Alien Atmospheres
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Heat shield design is one of the most critical aspects of missions that plan to either land on a planet’s (or moon’s) surface or return to our own. Spacecraft that have to survive the fiery, hypersonic plunge through an atmosphere require these systems. For decades, heat shields have been designed to slowly burn away in a process called ablation, which is intended to dissipate the incredible thermal energy or reentry. But, there’s another, less understood phenomenon that affects them too - spall
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Spacecraft Heat Shields Could Violently "Burst" When Plunging Into Alien Atmospheres By Andy Tomaswick - March 24, 2026 01:24 PM UTC | Missions Heat shield design is one of the most critical aspects of missions that plan to either land on a planet’s (or moon’s) surface or return to our own. Spacecraft that have to survive the fiery, hypersonic plunge through an atmosphere require these systems. For decades, heat shields have been designed to slowly burn away in a process called ablation, which is intended to dissipate the incredible thermal energy or reentry. But, there’s another, less understood phenomenon that affects them too - spallation, where a heat shield sheds material in violent, unpredictable “bursts”. This second mode of destruction seems to be particularly prevalent in oxygen-deprived atmospheres, like that of Titan, where the Dragonfly helicopter plans to land in the not too distant future. A new paper published in Carbon from researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign performed some tests showing just how different those heat shields might need to be. Phenolic Impregnated Carbon Ablator, or PICA, is the most successful heat shield material ever invented. After first being used on the Stardust sample return capsule, it’s since been used on Curiosity and Perseverance’s landing capsules, as well as the OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample return mission. A modified form, PICA-X, is currently being used on the Crew Dragon capsules that SpaceX uses to launch astronauts to the ISS. PICA starts its life as “FiberForm”, a low-density matrix of carbon fibers. Engineers then infuse this raw form with phenolic resin, creating the wonder material. During reentry, this combination allows the carbon matrix to char while the impregnated resin undergoes “pyrolysis”, collecting the heat from the extreme reentry speeds and then outgassing to cool the spacecraft down. Fraser discusses some milestones for the Dragonfly mission. Those methods are relatively well unde...
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