How Do Satellites Survive 4,000F + Degree Heat in Space?

Since the launch of Sputnik in the 1950s, thousands of satellites have been put into orbit around the Earth and even other planets. Each has served a different purpose, from complex space stations like the International Space Station to the Global Positioning System. Most satellites can be considered to be “in space”, but in terms of the Earth’s atmosphere, they reside in either the thermosphere or the exosphere. The layer through which a satellite orbits depends on what the satellite is used for and what kind of orbit it has.

The thermosphere is a region of very high temperature that extends from the top of the mesosphere at around 85 kilometers up to 640 kilometers above the Earth’s surface. It is called the thermosphere because temperatures spike to thermal levels

Temperatures are highly dependent on solar activity, and can rise to 2,000 °C (3,630 °F). Radiation causes the atmosphere particles in this layer to become electrically charged (see ionosphere), enabling radio waves to bounce off and be received beyond the horizon. In the exosphere, beginning at 500 to 1,000 kilometres (310 to 620 mi) above the Earth’s surface, the atmosphere turns into space.

The highly diluted gas in this layer can reach 2,500 °C (4,530 °F) during the day..  (Source)

The only elements in the periodic table that can withstand 2500°C are carbon, niobium, molybdenum, tantalum, tungsten, rhenium, and osmium. Except for carbon, these metals are very, very heavy and are of course extremely conductive to heat and most are very ductile when heat treated meaning they bend and coil. Carbon even has the highest thermal conductivities of all known materials! So, if you want to cook someone very efficiently and quickly, there is nothing better than a space capsule made out of graphite.

NASA’s blast furnace-proof International Space Station

The solar panels which adjorn these machines would barely function even if they could keep it together long enough. A British company found a drop of 1.1% of peak output for every increase in degrees Celsius of photovoltaic solar panels once the panels reached 42°C, and of course at 1414°C silicon actually melts. But wait… the Hubble Telescope and satellites uses gallium arsenide instead of silicon which melts at an even lower temperature of 1238°C.

Excuse number one comes from a few websites such as Wikipedia who wish to insult our intelligence to the max. Here is the main explanation for why satellites aren’t converted into man-made meteorites:

The highly diluted gas in this layer can reach 2500°C (4530°F) during the day. Even though the temperature is so high, one would not feel warm in the thermosphere, because it is so near vacuum that there is not enough contact with the few atoms of gas to transfer much heat.

Errr… wait a minute. I thought it is the sun that causes those few atoms of gas to heat up to 2500°C? Oh, it is.

Thermospheric temperatures increase with altitude due to absorption of highly energetic solar radiation.

The highly diluted gas in this layer can reach 2,500 °C (4,530 °F) during the day. Even though the temperature is so high, one would not feel warm in the thermosphere, because it is so near vacuum that there is not enough contact with the few atoms of gas to transfer much heat. A normal thermometer would be significantly below 0 °C (32 °F), because the energy lost by thermal radiation would exceed the energy acquired from the atmospheric gas by direct contact.