It so reads like science fiction, more so than anything I've ever seen.
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New Test suggests NASA's EM Drive will work in space
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It so reads like science fiction, more so than anything I've ever seen.
Quantum Mechanics is weird, most of it sounds like science fiction because at the very small scale, our universe plays by crazy rules.
Particles are not particles like we think the grain of sand is solid. They are just vibrations in the field, which are stable enough to remain vibrating forever, clump up into groups and get caught and rotate around each other.
CharmingCharlie
Member
The mind boggles if this pans out. The optimistic part of me would hope this brings a new age of progress for mankind. The more realistic part of me figures this will amount to sweet fuck all unless they can find some military application for it. Yup find away for this EM Drive to melt thousands of people and it will receive billions in research grants.
I also think NASA are getting a bit too much credit for this from what I have read NASA originally didn't want anything to do with the EM Drive. They only stepped in once the Chinese started sniffing around and got results.
I also think NASA are getting a bit too much credit for this from what I have read NASA originally didn't want anything to do with the EM Drive. They only stepped in once the Chinese started sniffing around and got results.
If this pans out, how much cheaper would it be to send satellites to other planets/moons? How much of the cost does fuel currently account for in missions like New Horizons? Could we send out 10 satellites for the current cost of 1? Imagine we could have satellites around every planet and moon in the solar system.
Evil_Silver
Banned
This is amazing.
Well, unless you die in the next twenty years, they're going to mars.
Wyndstryker
Member
Space Race 2: China vs US in who can make the first warp drive.
To be fair, There are still large societies who don't believe in EmDrive, simply because on paper it shouldn't even work. We give credit to NASA and China, because it took them to try his ridiculous idea to get things started and it turns out EmDrive works, thanks to the giants and now they have their own versions of it developed and without them trying, this wouldn't have happened.
frankie_baby
Member
Fixed
Unfortunately, most of the cost of sending a satellite to another planet comes from the cost of launching it off the ground, and the EM drive probably won't help with that unless it ends up being way more powerful than expected. Now, since an EM Drive equipped probe/satellite doesn't need weight for fuel, we might expect some savings from rocket launches just due to reduced weight requirements.
However, it would certainly make launching missions to distant planets like Neptune a heck of a lot cheaper. You might not need the larger rockets that are necessary for giving a craft that extra initial push. Furthermore, an EM Drive equipped craft doesn't need to make fuel-saving orbital transfers and slingshot maneuvers, so it wouldn't be limited to the same launch windows that current craft are limited to. For example, currently a launch window to travel to Mars via a Trans-Mars injection only opens once every two years. A Mars lander equipped with an EM drive could theoretically launch any time of the year, and make the trip much, much faster than a craft using an orbital transfer.
I am not sure if the EM Drive would be a radical cost-saving measure, but it would greatly expand the return on investment of each individual mission.
John Dunbar
correct about everything
so is that one milli-g just a random example because it's a nice even number? is there any reason to think it's either high or low balling what this thing could do, assuming of course that it works as intended?
i don't even know what milli-g is.
The inventor has same pretty ballsy claims in those youtube videos of his previously posted. Either way I would wait at least till the experiment is repeated at the Glenn Research Center:
Source
1 milli-g represents an acceleration equal to one thousandth of the acceleration due to Earth's gravity, ~ (9.8 m/s2)/1000.
It is energy from nothing, but it is not a new type of energy. We knew about it before, just nobody thought it can be harvested.
Quantum Vacuum is real. In the "empty space", virtual particles [quark and gluon field fluctuations] of very very very low energy state are created and destroyed all the time, so fast that they don't have time to interact with almost anything. The entire universe, all particles and radiation, all of that is made from fields that are fluctuating or that can be stretched by forces that act on large distances [gravity for example]. Everything is made from vibrations of those fields, and the lowest state of the field that creates particles is not resting at "zero state".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3xLuZNKhlY
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_state
In this drive however, short lived particles [quantum virtual plasma] are redirected to "flow" into certain direction while they are "alive", and some of them hit the specific wall of the engine. Because they hit that wall and not any other wall [they pop out from existence before they can do so], engine gets thrust.
That's the theory at least, there is still no concrete verified proof [but the engines do work
So, it's like .... the force? Also, would this prove (or disprove) any of the running "theories of everything"?
That's not all that hard to imagine. Use this technology to propel an object in space to relativistic speed and then .... uh.... point it back at the Earth.
Goddamn Brits with their timey wimey wavey cheating bullshit. Getting help from Time-lords is clearly cheating.
Naked Snake
Member
Famed physicist Lawrence Krauss tweets:
And links to this article: http://www.sciencealert.com/nasa-has-trialled-an-engine-that-would-take-us-to-Mars-in-10-weeks
What does it mean?
@lkrauss1 said:
And links to this article: http://www.sciencealert.com/nasa-has-trialled-an-engine-that-would-take-us-to-Mars-in-10-weeks
What does it mean?
Battersea Power Station
Member
I doubt it has anything to do with a theory of everything. Theories of everything have to be able to marry quantum mechanics and general relativity, the latter of which tends to break down when particles get really small and their position becomes uncertain.
This theoretical propulsion drive operates under the rules on quantum mechanics, so it has little to do with the insights of String Theory or any other unifying framework.
Grant approved.
Trojita
Rapid Response Threadmaker
The Scientific community can be very elitist and snobbish at times especially if a new theory or experiment opposes a commonly held idea or in this case calls into question the established laws of Physics altogether. It's not unusual for scientists that come out with contrary ideas to be the source of ridicule by a larger group of the scientific community.
The first thing that came to mind when the example stated 9.4% light speed by Alpha Centauri was,
"So, interstellar warfare is a thing humans are capable of now. That's interesting."
Suikoguy
I whinny my fervor lowly, for his length is not as great as those of the Hylian war stallions
I don't see how we can't confirm if this will work or not within our lifetimes. But yeah, space travel will continue to be a generational thing until we can perfect freezing. Even then, we still need a way to generate artificial gravity for sex.
TheLostBigBoss
Banned
Things just got a little more scary.
Trojita
Rapid Response Threadmaker
or you know being able to keep bone mass.
Suikoguy
I whinny my fervor lowly, for his length is not as great as those of the Hylian war stallions
Gotta have priorities.
We need to not let the other planets know or else we will have visitors quicker than we can say "relativistic object bombardment"
IMO, nothing has changed. All theories are the same, only now, short lived quantum vacuum particles that come in and out of existence everywhere around us can be redirected to flow in certain direction*.
*pending confirmation from multiple sources
Tal Shiar Agent
Member
Large rings rotating fast enough to produce 1G of force away from the center axis.
And avoid brain damage from cosmic particles.
Delta Assault
Member
I wanna be the Human Torch though.
massive. energy. shields.
humanity has just been looking for an excuse really. if we suddenly have a way to get there, the rest will fall into place.
Elfforkusu
Member
Yeah, both 2001: A Space Odyssey and Interstellar have examples of simple spaceship designs that use rotation for generating artificial gravity. The same principle can be scaled up significantly too. I think the example ship in the article linked to in the OP even has two rotating rings for living space.
Naked Snake
Member
Dat global warming doe
Suikoguy
I whinny my fervor lowly, for his length is not as great as those of the Hylian war stallions
If it's true, it's probably the single most important discovery for space anything.
I wonder how long it will take to confirm it, or prove it wrong.
I'm confused. Didn't the Russians already test that? Or is there some sort of fertility issue I'm not aware of? Surely any physical issues could be solved by a cargo net or something.
Suikoguy
I whinny my fervor lowly, for his length is not as great as those of the Hylian war stallions
As am I now, some additional searching shows I might be wrong.
Gravity plays a huge role in human development. Even if you figure out how to have sex in zero g, its not yet known what effect it will have on a fetus.
Artificial gravity is a must.
Orbis Tabula
Member
Hahahaha, I suppose that's a very good point.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Honestly I could totally believe that this totally exists and works for the kind of microthrust in question
But the idea that its ever going to scale up into something feasible for space travel is...questionable
But the idea that its ever going to scale up into something feasible for space travel is...questionable
SwiftDeath
Member
I keep expecting to come back to this thread and read it was all some elaborate joke
This seems amazing to me. Even if it doesn't scale as well as is suggested, it should still have incredibly valuable and pronounced impact on the way we operate in space
How small can these things be and what kind of energy requirements are there?
Wonder if we could make a mini one to fit on a person for space walks etc.?
This seems amazing to me. Even if it doesn't scale as well as is suggested, it should still have incredibly valuable and pronounced impact on the way we operate in space
How small can these things be and what kind of energy requirements are there?
Wonder if we could make a mini one to fit on a person for space walks etc.?
I just want a jetpack tbh
If it's not yet known what effect it will have, how do you know artificial gravity is a must?
If it's truly unknown, then it would seem the answer is "Artificial gravity might be a must, pending further research."
I know some problems are known, like bone mass, however. Some science fiction books have distant-future human descendents who genetically engineered their whole family lines to be specifically tailored for zero-gravity situations. I imagine that might be possible in the future, but that always gets into ethical situations to me with a sort of "space master race".
Kai Dracon
Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
The thing about space travel, is all you need is a tiny amount of thrust... applied consistently over a long period of time.
Even if there turns out to be some arcane limitation on this effect scaling upwards past a certain point, the prospect of a persistent thruster that does not require a tank of rocket fuel has applications.
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