Though ghostly in appearance like a hologram, aerogel is very solid and feels like hard styrofoam to the touch. Aerogel was used on the Stardust spacecraft to capture comet particles from Comet Wild 2 in January 2004.
Though ghostly in appearance like a hologram, aerogel is very solid and feels like hard styrofoam to the touch. Aerogel was used on the Stardust spacecraft to capture comet particles from Comet Wild 2 in January 2004.
Stardust is set to return to Earth with the particles on January 15, 2006.Image Credit: NASA/JPL