Long Duration Exposure Facility experiment M0003 deintegration/findings and impacts

The Aerospace Corporation LDEF Experiment M0003 was designed to study the effect of the space environment on a large variety of spacecraft materials and components, both current and developmental. The experiment was housed in four LDEF trays and contained over 1200 specimens, two data systems, and two environment exposure control canisters. Effects of the space environment such as vacuum, ultraviolet, atomic oxygen, meteoroid and debris, thermal cycling and synergistic effects on various samples are described, and summaries of the board data are presented.