Status Report on the Tau Zero Foundation

Centauri Dreams ^ | 11/19/10 | PAUL GILSTER

[KevinDavis]

A number of things have been happening recently with the Tau Zero Foundation, but most of them have been behind the scenes. Marc Millis, founding architect of the TZF and former head of NASA’s Breakthrough Propulsion Physics project, now goes public with his thoughts on recent activities and where the Foundation is heading.

To the fans and contributors of Tau Zero, thanks for your help and suggestions. It’s time to talk about recent progress and next-steps. One major news item is that I took an early retirement from NASA, in February 2010, so that I could devote more time to Tau Zero. As much as I tried, I could not do both. I had to make the hard choice between following NASA or leaving that full-salary day-job to make advances via the more flexible Tau Zero Foundation. Now that I’m free of prior restrictions, we are restructuring how we operate and will be eventually shifting to a “Membership” format with regular newsletters.

[KevinDavis]

[KevinDavis]

[AZ .44 MAG]

Tau Zero. I loved the story by Poul Anderson.

But wasn’t there some WorShip required towards the end?

[KevinDavis]

I don’t know..

[AZ .44 MAG]

I could be confusing stories from 30+ years ago.

[RJR_fan]

You're recalling The Jesus Incident, one of the vilest books I've ever read. The only book I purchased new, and put in the trash after completing. Like Heinlein, Herbert was an apostate Baptist.

[AZ .44 MAG]

Thanks for jogging my memory.

The author was Frank Herbert. The book I was thinking of was Destination: Void.

The Jesus Incident was its sequel, which I don't remember reading.

[AZ .44 MAG]

I was wrong about the WorShip part. If you’re interested see my previous post on this thread.

If not, then thanks for the Space pings & Happy Thanksgiving.

[Brett66]

I’m curious why they think old-style HE3 fusion is the way to go in regards to their Icarus study, I believe the old Tokomak/HE3 type of fusion is an unworkable approach.

The aneutronic/focus fusion approach with the common fuel for a boron/hydrogen reaction seems far more workable for fusion propulsion.

http://focusfusion.org/

[GOPJ]

Thanks for the ping.

[darth]

Ten or so years ago I was part of an unofficial NASA/USAF/DOE weekly telecon devoted to breakthrough propulsion concepts.

There were serious scientists working on wormholes, antimatter storage, zero point energy, and anti-gravity.

I was a champion of a more near term breakthrough, tethers made of carbon nanotubes. If we made it a national priority, I think we could have an elevator to geosych orbit within 50 years.

The USA is very good at breakthroughs such as the atomic bomb, Apollo moon landings, and the Space Shuttle. We only need ONE breakthrough to change everything.