[kaiju0]

Interstellar ships will be shaped like pencils to deflect rather than impact gasses. They will also have to have consumable nose cone sections with old ones in the front being removed and new ones installed at that back. Like a mechanical pencil.

[GioM]

Arthur C Clarke posits a consumable shield made of ice in The Songs of Distant Earth [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Songs_of_Distant_Earth

[FlyMoreRockets]

Or like a funnel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bussard_ramjet

[pluto9]

What happens when the ship has to turn around to decelerate, with its engines facing the front?

[mleonhard]

The turn-around takes place at the half-way point of the journey. This means that for the entire second half of the journey, the engine is pointed at the oncoming dust.

Engines used in such long journeys will likely emit a thin stream of particles at extreme velocities. This stream is not wide enough or thick enough to stop space dust from hitting the engine. An unshielded forward-facing engine will get destroyed. So we must shield the engine.

Instead of having two shields and turning the ship around, just turn the engine around. Make the engine emit streams forward from the sides of the ship.

[pmayrgundter]

Zubrin, in Entering Space, introduced me to the idea of using a solar or much larger magnetic sail to drag against the outcoming solar wind of the destination star. So that's one way to spend no energy slowing down for interstellar travel.

[undersuit]

Turn on the drives as soon as you can for the deceleration burn and pray.

[mrob]

The only realistic option is another set of engines on the other end.