Posted on 03/24/2016 2:41:15 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The travel time from Earth to Mars using current space flight technologies is estimated to be 9 months.
Last week, an innovative concept was proposed which claims to reduce the time that will be spent for Mars travel to merely three days through so-called photonic propulsion technology. But a new proposal threatens to radically shorten this period to an astounding 30 minutes.
The idea was revealed by Phillip Lubin, who is a physics professor at the University of California Santa Barbara. Lubin was also responsible for the photonic propulsion technology proposal. This time, however, he identified the use of high-powered lasers to propel wafer-thin spacecrafts to the Red Planet faster than the speed of light. Lubin wrote in an email to Headlines and Global News that using a "directed energy propulsion," which involved firing laser at a spacecraft, can revolutionize space travel because it will lead to the achievement of frictionless acceleration.
"As an example, on the eventual upper end, a full-scale (50-70 GW) DE-STAR 4 - Directed Energy System for Targeting of Asteroids and Exploration - will propel a wafer scale spacecraft with a one meter sail to about 26 percent the speed of light in about 10 minutes," Lubin was quoted as saying in a Daily Mail report. "[It would] reach Mars (1 AU) in 30 minutes, pass Voyager 1 in less than 3 days, pass 1,000 AU in 12 days and reach Alpha Centauri in about 15 years."
As a proposed precursor to interstellar travel, Lubin's concept has been met with a bit of skepticism due to some perceived flaws. For example, there is the question about deceleration once the low-mass probe approaches Mars, according to an email from Lubin. There is also a concern about space junk, which could hinder the spacecraft's progress or even pose serious harm to the vessel itself. Finally, some experts cite the issue of time dilation, a concept demonstrated in the film "Interstellar." Here, time slows down for the spacecraft as it passes a wormhole, according to Digital Trends. This means that while space travel takes 30 minutes, it could equal a decade here on Earth.
Lubin states that his proposal is still a concept and will be refined further in the future. For more information, the physicist has published his laser propulsion proposal in the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society.
It’s the same theory you should use if you ever found yourself on a falling elevator...be sure to jump before the bottom.
Traveling at the speed of light if you hit anything at that speed, even a dust particle, would be the equivalent of a nuclear bomb going off.
The writer does not have a clue about what he’s talking about. Time dilation from our frame of reference, would occur on the spacecraft not on Earth. He needs to back to writing children’s books.
What happens if you order thick crust?
Lou Malnati’s is going to have to up it’s game.
I hadn't heard of that one. Kennedy wanted a man on the Moon by the end of the 1960s decade, which was accomplished. I remember watching the live broadcast of the first Moon landing with my dad, who died a couple years later. It was amazing that he went from an era common with horses, he started driving a Model-T, then used the first radios, then the first TVs, capped by a landing on the Moon - all in his lifetime. I heard projections of getting a man on Mars by 1987. Now we can't even build bridges without Chinese help (most components of our rebuilt SF-Oakland bridge were built in China and shipped here), let alone get into space without Russian help. Sigh...
one of many (search for Project Orion; click on a video - not to be confused with NASA’s lame capsule of the same name)
Project Orion: A Re-Imagining (old)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1vKMTYa40A
To Mars By A Bomb - The Secret History of Project Orion (Nuclear Propulsion)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYoLcJuBtOw
Orion was to be interstellar as well as intersystem; the bigger it was the better it worked; crews would be in the hundreds; vehicle was to be surrounded by water to shield crew from radiation; hot showers for all every day; and so on.
If the hildabeast gets elected, count me in. Might be more fun! Big chance to get away from it all, you know... can't be any worse. Can I bring my own weapons?
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