Research on B₄C/PEEK Composite Material Radiation Shielding

There are various types of charged particles in the space environment, which can cause different types of radiation damage to materials and devices, leading to on-orbit failures and even accidents for spacecraft. Developing lightweight and efficient radiation-shielding materials is an effective approach to improving the inherent protection of spacecraft. The protective performance of different materials against proton and electron spectra in the Earth's radiation belts is evaluated using a Geant4 simulation. Based on the simulation results, suitable hardening components were selected to design composite materials, and B₄C/PEEK composites with different B₄C contents were successfully prepared. The experimental results demonstrate that the simulated and experimental results for the electron, proton and neutron shielding performance of the B₄C/PEEK composites are consistent. These composites exhibit excellent radiation shielding capabilities against electrons, protons and neutrons, and the radiation protection performance improves with increasing B₄C content in the B₄C/PEEK composite materials.