• Close-up view comparing the yellow, tan brown, small weaved fabric on a Russian cosmonaut's glove versus the larger weaved fabric on the glove of a U.S. astronaut. The U.S. glove has lunar dust on the fabric.
    Download Image

    Under a microscope, you can see the differences between the weave of Russian fabric (on the left) to that used in Beta cloth (on the right) used in U.S. astronaut gloves. Beta cloth is a Teflon coated fiberglass material made by Dow Corning. This microscopic image of Beta cloth is covered in lunar dust. The microscopic image of the Russian fabric on the left was taken from Vasily Tsibliyev’s Soyuz TM-17 Orlan Glove.

  • Close-up view comparing the yellow, tan brown, small weaved fabric on a Russian cosmonaut's glove versus the larger weaved fabric on the glove of a U.S. astronaut. The U.S. glove has lunar dust on the fabric.

ID#:

WEB14594-2015

Source:

Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum

Copyright:

Smithsonian Institution

Rights Usage:

Contact Smithsonian Institution

Terms of Use:

Smithsonian Terms of Use

For print or commercial use please see permissions information.