Hypervelocity Impact Testing and Simulation at the University of Padova

Abstract The increasing clutter of human-generated debris in Earth’s orbit, including defunct satellites, rocket bodies, and fragments from in-orbit collisions, poses a significant hazard to space exploration. Even millimeter-size object can inflict severe damage at hypervelocity impact speeds, making the study of hypervelocity impacts crucial for ensuring safe and sustainable space operations. In this context, the Space Debris Group of the University of Padova, Italy, researches effects and consequences of hypervelocity collisions. A facility, equipped with a two-stage light-gas gun capable of accelerating projectiles to velocities of up to 5.5 km/s, allows the investigation of the behavior of next-generation materials under hypervelocity impacts, and the study of the fragmentation of complex structures; among them, a detailed study of a picosatellite break-up is performed. The ongoing test campaign focuses on defining the impact geometry’s (inclination, velocity, and projectile material) role in influencing the fragmentation patterns of the mock-ups. Simultaneously, a numerical code, capable of simulating impacts performed within the laboratory as well as in-space collision events, was developed. The code has been validated against experimental results, and it is used to generate a dataset of simulated impact scenarios. The results of these analyses are used to improve the understanding of hypervelocity impact phenomena and to develop more accurate models of material behavior. In this paper, both the tests and the simulations of collisions against the picosatellite mockup are presented.