Lots of debris is likely not magnetic, and much of this stuff is miles away from eachother traveling at incredible speeds. You couldn't make a device fast enough to change direction and have enough magnetic force to capture much.
>...it only makes matters worse since it can turn bigger debris into multiple smaller ones.
That's the question, would it though? Real lasers don't behave like hollywood lasers. And are smaller pieces worse than large ones? Maybe the type of material could be detected, and laser based cleaning would work perfectly well with some types of material?
I suspect a laser would melt and cut up debris. Void is an insulator and the only way to dissipate heat is through radiation.
Smaller pieces are worse because they're more numerous if you break up a bigger piece and harder to spot and avoid. Also the probability of a crash increases with the number of debris.
Sure, but my understanding is that there are so many micrometeors already, they can't leave windows open to space for any extended period of time. There's already tiny particles flying around that they can't do a think about about. This implies that more small stuff shouldn't matter in the least, as they already have no choice but to have protection against this.
That means, there is a size small enough that it's no longer an issue. For someone knowledgable, I think it's simple to determine a ratio of size/speed/material type to determine whether or not to shoot the object with a laser or some other method.
>...it only makes matters worse since it can turn bigger debris into multiple smaller ones.
That's the question, would it though? Real lasers don't behave like hollywood lasers. And are smaller pieces worse than large ones? Maybe the type of material could be detected, and laser based cleaning would work perfectly well with some types of material?