10 ways to traverse deep space.

[STDiva]

http://www.newscientist.com/article...en-ways-to-traverse-deep-space.html?full=true

All in good time. All in good time.

 

[~~whimsy~~]

Once we find the proper way to fly in space all we need to do after that is find a way to build a light saber

Beyond that, the closest planet that resembles anything that of Earth is in the next galaxy over and that one has two revolving stars rotating around it.

I honestly don't want to live on Mars given their active volcano the size of Texas, 800 mile wide landslides, and the dirt devils are the size of our regular huge ass tornadoes.

I'll just leave my space travel for games like KOTOR, Mass Effect, and Cowboy Bebop anime

 

[Wainkerr99]

Earth to Mars in 39 days. Uuuaaaaauuuuu. I can live with that. Who would have thought that we would hear of such a thing so soon. This is a bit, in fact a lot of positive knowledge to end the year and begin the new one with.

Of course, once we reach another star, we can always peek around, and move on from there, perhaps with newer, faster technology. Throw in the odd slingshot and you are on your way.

 

[calpoon]

Great article. Some of the comments are even more interesting.

As the commentary points out one of the major obstacles to interstellar travel is space dust. Even micrograms of dust bunnies would be like firing missiles into the rocket when they are traveling potentially 1000's of miles a second and thousands of degrees in temperature from the friction. The ship would require a 100 ton armor plating, and then it could never be launched from Earth.

...which is actually something that I'm surprised they didn't mention: NOT launching a rocket from Earth. Building and sending off a rocket from orbit, avoiding the 90% use of fuel required to break out of the gravity well could be the greatest advance in rocket propulsion technology.

 

[Wainkerr99]

^^ Yeah huh. I was going to mention that. Space station first, space ship later. Of course there would be a lot of back and forth for a while, though, with either ready made parts or raw materials. That could prove to be costly. Plus, it would help to have shields. They may not be Star Trek shields or deflector, but some sort of rudimentary energy forcefield will be in place.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/11/081104-magnetic-shield.html

It all comes down to nations co-operating with nations instead of 'nations rising up against nations'.

 

[No_Man]

Great article. Some of the comments are even more interesting.

As the commentary points out one of the major obstacles to interstellar travel is space dust. Even micrograms of dust bunnies would be like firing missiles into the rocket when they are traveling potentially 1000's of miles a second and thousands of degrees in temperature from the friction. The ship would require a 100 ton armor plating, and then it could never be launched from Earth.

...which is actually something that I'm surprised they didn't mention: NOT launching a rocket from Earth. Building and sending off a rocket from orbit, avoiding the 90% use of fuel required to break out of the gravity well could be the greatest advance in rocket propulsion technology.

I knew a professor in college who had worked for a while at Battelle. According to him, practical force field technology is not that far away. The biggest challenge right now is supplying power. They had working force fields that could fully repel low mass objects at low velocities, and slow down high mass/velocity objects, but they required a row of supercapacitors the size of a semi for even a few minutes of power.

As far as not launching from earth, I fully agree. I think the plans for a moon base are the best bet in that regard. Orbital space stations are nice, but they're hard to dock to, require constant supplies, and are extremely vulnerable to meteoroids and space trash. A moon base might be able to supply its own air and water, is out of the debris cloud of the earth, has the moon itself as a shield, and is low enough gravity that landing and take-off don't require a great deal of fuel.

 

[D-rock]

Remember how decades ago how some people though we might have flying cars and have colonies on the moon at this time. Moral of the story, don't get your hopes up.