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Timber Up
Japan has successfully launched the world's first satellite made of wood.
The spacecraft, dubbed LignoSat, came about as a collaboration between Kyoto University and homebuilder Sumitomo Forestry and was launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Tuesday.
It sets an important precedent, with its creators hoping to demonstrate the use of an entirely renewable material in space that could minimize its environmental impact once it's retired. Instead of releasing harmful particles like their metal counterparts, wooden satellites could harmlessly burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.
Wood is also surprisingly durable in space due to the lack of water or oxygen, and could efficiently protect electronics in orbit while reducing weight.
"Early 1900s airplanes were made of wood," Kyoto University forest science professor Koji Murata told Reuters. "A wooden satellite should be feasible, too."
Bonfire of the Orbitals
Japanese astronaut Takao Doi, who has visited the International Space Station before, had some choice words for the project.
"With timber, a material we can produce by ourselves, we will be able to build houses, live and work in space forever," he told Reuters.
Doi also pointed out that metal satellites release aluminum oxide particles while reentering the Earth's atmosphere, something previous research has shown could have a devastating impact on our planet's ozone layer.
"Metal satellites might be banned in the future," he said. "If we can prove our first wooden satellite works, we want to pitch it to Elon Musk’s SpaceX."
The team at Kyoto University concluded that lumber from the Japanese magnolia tree stood up to the harsh space environment the best after conducting an experiment on board the ISS.
Interestingly, LignoSat is being held together without any screws or glue thanks to the use of a traditional Japanese woodworking technique called honoki.
The plan is to have it orbit the Earth for half a year while sensors record how it weathers the extreme environment. The team is also interested in the material's ability to shield semiconductors from space radiation.
"It may seem outdated, but wood is actually cutting-edge technology as civilisation heads to the Moon and Mars," Sumitomo Forestry Tsukuba Research Institute manager Kenji Kariya told Reuters. "Expansion to space could invigorate the timber industry."
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