Magnetic field employed to repel rocks from space craft?

Has there been any thought given to the use of magnetic fields to redirect iron-rich space debris away from space craft?

I’m interested in the context of the question… are you talking about preventing orbital collisions, or about deflecting cosmic dust during high-speed interstellar travel, à la Star Trek’s navigational deflector?

I know there’s been a lot of real-world research and discussion of the use of electromagnetic fields to shield against radiation, but most of what I’ve seen covering realistic (sub-light) interstellar travel figures ablative physical shielding is feasible to protect against dust impacts.

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Thanks Todd, enjoyed those links. Especially the PBS video on the estimated shielding required to protect a sub-light craft for close interstellar journeys. I was thinking more of this application, and even closer to home with satellites (and presumably orbiting crewed craft) being impacted by metallic dust particles (https://spacenews.com/dust-particles-cause-problems-for-satellites/) from comets etc. Of course a major difference being the impacts are more indiscriminate and not just concentrated at the ‘front’ of the craft.

I finally got to that interesting article. It mentions:

They believe that dust grains vaporise on impact, creating a hot, conducting plasma that can induce currents that seriously perturb electronic systems on spacecraft, potentially rendering them helpless.

I’d need a physicist for all my questions: would the speeds involved mean we’d need an extremely strong magnetic field? What would it take to generate that? Would it result in the same vaporization and plasma flare as impact with a surface? If so, would it happen far enough away to prevent complications?

And:

We also found residues of aluminium and titanium from space debris in the smallest craters

I guess magnetism won’t help with that… :thinking: