Dosimetry in the SpaceThe radiation protection of astronauts during space missions

Abstract

The Space Radiation represents a serious risk for astronauts during space missions. The risk related to the space radiation exposure could involve acute and/or late effects. The Solar Cosmic Radiation that consists of protons (≈98%) with a very wide spectrum in energy (up to several GeV), is the major source of exposure for the crew. In this PhD work I present the results of the validation of the electromagnetic and hadronic physical processes with the aim to contribute to the study of radiation protection for astronauts, in particular against the radiation due to the Solar Particle Events (SPE). The simulations were performed using Geant4 and MULASSIS, a module to the Spenvis software, with protons of energy characteristic of SPE, on a slab of aluminum of mass thickness of 20 g / cm2. The results obtained by the simulation were compared with PSTAR database of the NIST and experimental data measured during the experiment conducted at the NASA, Space Radiation Laboratory (NSRL), Brookhaven National Laboratory, USA. Moreover after validation, other materials were tested, in particular were studied the trends of dose of these materials.