| Abstract Scope |
The extreme environments required to succeed in robotic space exploration create significant challenges on structural materials. In many cases, the demands on existing materials exceeds their performance limitations, requiring the development of new materials and manufacturing techniques. This talk will focus on some of the areas where the performance of metallic materials is at the limit, including applications such as spacecraft thermal devices, rover wheels and mobility systems, micrometeoroid shielding, mechanisms, gears, and other high-performance structural hardware. To solve these problems, JPL has focused on developing new alloys and additive manufacturing methods to gain performance benefits that were not previously possible. |