Patent ID: 8053492

Claim:
A method of protecting an object comprising: (a) providing an object with a surface; (b) protecting the surface from atomic oxygen and ultraviolet light with a polymeric coating, where the polymeric coating includes a polyimide polymer produced by: (i) reacting at least one acid monomer with at least one diamine monomer to form a polyamic acid backbone, where the monomers are selected such that the polyamic acid backbone includes a non-terminal attachment point, (ii) after step (i), imidizing the polyamic acid backbone to form a polyimide polymer backbone; and (iii) after step (ii), attaching an oligomeric silsesquioxane (OS) compound to the attachment point on the polyimide polymer backbone, such that the OS compound is connected to the polyimide polymer backbone; and (c) curing the polymeric coating on the surface of the object at a temperature not exceeding 50 degrees centigrade.