Why do the Trisolarans lose ships to space dust? And are they vulnerable to nuclear weapons?
Thanks everyone for your responses to my previous question. My question this time pertains to the hulls of the Trisolaran fleet. While rereading the chapter where the Trisolarans construct the sophons, one says that not all of the Trisolaran fleet will make it to Earth because of the space dust. What I think is being implied here is that the Trisolaran fleet is moving fast enough that collision with the dust will damage some of their ships. But by this point Trisolarans have already mastered strong interaction forces enough to make sophons and probably the droplet, so I was imagining that the ships have some kind of strong interaction material as the hull.
In the Dark Forest chapter with Ding Yi, we learn that the strong interaction material is infinitely smooth and likely impervious to any kind of scratching that humans are capable of. Does this mean that strong interaction materials are still vulnerable at 10% lightspeed, or that the ships have weaker material for the hull? Also, does this say anything about humanity's ability to damage the Trisolaran ships with nuclear weapons?