space travel how fast

Warp drives: Physicists give chances of faster-than -light space travel a boost

Associate Professor of Physics, Oklahoma State University

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Mario Borunda does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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The closest star to Earth is Proxima Centauri. It is about 4.25 light-years away, or about 25 trillion miles (40 trillion km). The fastest ever spacecraft, the now- in-space Parker Solar Probe will reach a top speed of 450,000 mph. It would take just 20 seconds to go from Los Angeles to New York City at that speed, but it would take the solar probe about 6,633 years to reach Earth’s nearest neighboring solar system.

If humanity ever wants to travel easily between stars, people will need to go faster than light. But so far, faster-than-light travel is possible only in science fiction.

In Issac Asimov’s Foundation series , humanity can travel from planet to planet, star to star or across the universe using jump drives. As a kid, I read as many of those stories as I could get my hands on. I am now a theoretical physicist and study nanotechnology, but I am still fascinated by the ways humanity could one day travel in space.

Some characters – like the astronauts in the movies “Interstellar” and “Thor” – use wormholes to travel between solar systems in seconds. Another approach – familiar to “Star Trek” fans – is warp drive technology. Warp drives are theoretically possible if still far-fetched technology. Two recent papers made headlines in March when researchers claimed to have overcome one of the many challenges that stand between the theory of warp drives and reality.

But how do these theoretical warp drives really work? And will humans be making the jump to warp speed anytime soon?

Compression and expansion

Physicists’ current understanding of spacetime comes from Albert Einstein’s theory of General Relativity . General Relativity states that space and time are fused and that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. General relativity also describes how mass and energy warp spacetime – hefty objects like stars and black holes curve spacetime around them. This curvature is what you feel as gravity and why many spacefaring heroes worry about “getting stuck in” or “falling into” a gravity well. Early science fiction writers John Campbell and Asimov saw this warping as a way to skirt the speed limit.

What if a starship could compress space in front of it while expanding spacetime behind it? “Star Trek” took this idea and named it the warp drive.

In 1994, Miguel Alcubierre, a Mexican theoretical physicist, showed that compressing spacetime in front of the spaceship while expanding it behind was mathematically possible within the laws of General Relativity . So, what does that mean? Imagine the distance between two points is 10 meters (33 feet). If you are standing at point A and can travel one meter per second, it would take 10 seconds to get to point B. However, let’s say you could somehow compress the space between you and point B so that the interval is now just one meter. Then, moving through spacetime at your maximum speed of one meter per second, you would be able to reach point B in about one second. In theory, this approach does not contradict the laws of relativity since you are not moving faster than light in the space around you. Alcubierre showed that the warp drive from “Star Trek” was in fact theoretically possible.

Proxima Centauri here we come, right? Unfortunately, Alcubierre’s method of compressing spacetime had one problem: it requires negative energy or negative mass.

A negative energy problem

Alcubierre’s warp drive would work by creating a bubble of flat spacetime around the spaceship and curving spacetime around that bubble to reduce distances. The warp drive would require either negative mass – a theorized type of matter – or a ring of negative energy density to work. Physicists have never observed negative mass, so that leaves negative energy as the only option.

To create negative energy, a warp drive would use a huge amount of mass to create an imbalance between particles and antiparticles. For example, if an electron and an antielectron appear near the warp drive, one of the particles would get trapped by the mass and this results in an imbalance. This imbalance results in negative energy density. Alcubierre’s warp drive would use this negative energy to create the spacetime bubble.

But for a warp drive to generate enough negative energy, you would need a lot of matter. Alcubierre estimated that a warp drive with a 100-meter bubble would require the mass of the entire visible universe .

In 1999, physicist Chris Van Den Broeck showed that expanding the volume inside the bubble but keeping the surface area constant would reduce the energy requirements significantly , to just about the mass of the sun. A significant improvement, but still far beyond all practical possibilities.

A sci-fi future?

Two recent papers – one by Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire and another by Erik Lentz – provide solutions that seem to bring warp drives closer to reality.

Bobrick and Martire realized that by modifying spacetime within the bubble in a certain way, they could remove the need to use negative energy. This solution, though, does not produce a warp drive that can go faster than light.

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Independently, Lentz also proposed a solution that does not require negative energy. He used a different geometric approach to solve the equations of General Relativity, and by doing so, he found that a warp drive wouldn’t need to use negative energy. Lentz’s solution would allow the bubble to travel faster than the speed of light.

It is essential to point out that these exciting developments are mathematical models. As a physicist, I won’t fully trust models until we have experimental proof. Yet, the science of warp drives is coming into view. As a science fiction fan, I welcome all this innovative thinking. In the words of Captain Picard , things are only impossible until they are not.

• General Relativity
• Theoretical physics
• Interstellar
• Speed of light
• Albert Einstein

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How Humanity Can Travel Incredibly Fast In Space Explored

Posted: April 7, 2024 | Last updated: April 7, 2024

Limitless Space Institute compares the travel time of spacecraft propelled by nuclear power to that of imaginative fusion propulsion. Credit: Limitless Space Institute

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Space Travel Calculator

One small step for man, one giant leap for humanity, how fast can we travel in space is interstellar travel possible, can humans travel at the speed of light – relativistic space travel, space travel calculator – relativistic rocket equation, intergalactic travel – fuel problem, how do i calculate the travel time to other planets.

Ever since the dawn of civilization, the idea of space travel has fascinated humans! Haven't we all looked up into the night sky and dreamed about space?

With the successful return of the first all-civilian crew of SpaceX's Inspiration4 mission after orbiting the Earth for three days, the dream of space travel looks more and more realistic now.

While traveling deep into space is still something out of science fiction movies like Star Trek and Star Wars, the tremendous progress made by private space companies so far seems very promising. Someday, space travel (or even interstellar travel) might be accessible to everyone!

It's never too early to start planning for a trip of a lifetime (or several lifetimes). You can also plan your own space trip and celebrate World Space Week in your own special way!

This space travel calculator is a comprehensive tool that allows you to estimate many essential parameters in theoretical interstellar space travel . Have you ever wondered how fast we can travel in space, how much time it will take to get to the nearest star or galaxy, or how much fuel it requires? In the following article, using a relativistic rocket equation, we'll try to answer questions like "Is interstellar travel possible?" , and "Can humans travel at the speed of light?"

Explore the world of light-speed travel of (hopefully) future spaceships with our relativistic space travel calculator!

If you're interested in astrophysics, check out our other calculators. Find out the speed required to leave the surface of any planet with the escape velocity calculator or estimate the parameters of the orbital motion of planets using the orbital velocity calculator .

Although human beings have been dreaming about space travel forever, the first landmark in the history of space travel is Russia's launch of Sputnik 2 into space in November 1957. The spacecraft carried the first earthling, the Russian dog Laika , into space.

Four years later, on 12 April 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri A. Gagarin became the first human in space when his spacecraft, the Vostok 1, completed one orbit of Earth.

The first American astronaut to enter space was Alan Shepard (May 1961). During the Apollo 11 mission in July 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to land on the moon. Between 1969 and 1972, a total of 12 astronauts walked the moon, marking one of the most outstanding achievements for NASA.

In recent decades, space travel technology has seen some incredible advancements. Especially with the advent of private space companies like SpaceX, Virgin Galactic, and Blue Origin, the dream of space tourism is looking more and more realistic for everyone!

However, when it comes to including women, we are yet to make great strides. So far, 566 people have traveled to space. Only 65 of them were women .

Although the first woman in space, a Soviet astronaut Valentina Tereshkova , who orbited Earth 48 times, went into orbit in June 1963. It was only in October 2019 that the first all-female spacewalk was completed by NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Christina Koch.

Women's access to space is still far from equal, but there are signs of progress, like NASA planning to land the first woman and first person of color on the moon by 2024 with its Artemis missions. World Space Week is also celebrating the achievements and contributions of women in space this year!

In the following sections, we will explore the feasibility of space travel and its associated challenges.

Interstellar space is a rather empty place. Its temperature is not much more than the coldest possible temperature, i.e., an absolute zero. It equals about 3 kelvins – minus 270 °C or minus 455 °F. You can't find air there, and therefore there is no drag or friction. On the one hand, humans can't survive in such a hostile place without expensive equipment like a spacesuit or a spaceship, but on the other hand, we can make use of space conditions and its emptiness.

The main advantage of future spaceships is that, since they are moving through a vacuum, they can theoretically accelerate to infinite speeds! However, this is only possible in the classical world of relatively low speeds, where Newtonian physics can be applied. Even if it's true, let's imagine, just for a moment, that we live in a world where any speed is allowed. How long will it take to visit the Andromeda Galaxy, the nearest galaxy to the Milky Way?

We will begin our intergalactic travel with a constant acceleration of 1 g (9.81 m/s² or 32.17 ft/s²) because it ensures that the crew experiences the same comfortable gravitational field as the one on Earth. By using this space travel calculator in Newton's universe mode, you can find out that you need about 2200 years to arrive at the nearest galaxy! And, if you want to stop there, you need an additional 1000 years . Nobody lives for 3000 years! Is intergalactic travel impossible for us, then? Luckily, we have good news. We live in a world of relativistic effects, where unusual phenomena readily occur.

In the previous example, where we traveled to Andromeda Galaxy, the maximum velocity was almost 3000 times greater than the speed of light c = 299,792,458 m/s , or about c = 3 × 10 8 m/s using scientific notation.

However, as velocity increases, relativistic effects start to play an essential role. According to special relativity proposed by Albert Einstein, nothing can exceed the speed of light. How can it help us with interstellar space travel? Doesn't it mean we will travel at a much lower speed? Yes, it does, but there are also a few new relativistic phenomena, including time dilation and length contraction, to name a few. The former is crucial in relativistic space travel.

Time dilation is a difference of time measured by two observers, one being in motion and the second at rest (relative to each other). It is something we are not used to on Earth. Clocks in a moving spaceship tick slower than the same clocks on Earth ! Time passing in a moving spaceship T T T and equivalent time observed on Earth t t t are related by the following formula:

where γ \gamma γ is the Lorentz factor that comprises the speed of the spaceship v v v and the speed of light c c c :

where β = v / c \beta = v/c β = v / c .

For example, if γ = 10 \gamma = 10 γ = 10 ( v = 0.995 c v = 0.995c v = 0.995 c ), then every second passing on Earth corresponds to ten seconds passing in the spaceship. Inside the spacecraft, events take place 90 percent slower; the difference can be even greater for higher velocities. Note that both observers can be in motion, too. In that case, to calculate the relative relativistic velocity, you can use our velocity addition calculator .

Let's go back to our example again, but this time we're in Einstein's universe of relativistic effects trying to reach Andromeda. The time needed to get there, measured by the crew of the spaceship, equals only 15 years ! Well, this is still a long time, but it is more achievable in a practical sense. If you would like to stop at the destination, you should start decelerating halfway through. In this situation, the time passed in the spaceship will be extended by about 13 additional years .

Unfortunately, this is only a one-way journey. You can, of course, go back to Earth, but nothing will be the same. During your interstellar space travel to the Andromeda Galaxy, about 2,500,000 years have passed on Earth. It would be a completely different planet, and nobody could foresee the fate of our civilization.

A similar problem was considered in the first Planet of the Apes movie, where astronauts crash-landed back on Earth. While these astronauts had only aged by 18 months, 2000 years had passed on Earth (sorry for the spoilers, but the film is over 50 years old at this point, you should have seen it by now). How about you? Would you be able to leave everything you know and love about our galaxy forever and begin a life of space exploration?

Now that you know whether interstellar travel is possible and how fast we can travel in space, it's time for some formulas. In this section, you can find the "classical" and relativistic rocket equations that are included in the relativistic space travel calculator.

There could be four combinations since we want to estimate how long it takes to arrive at the destination point at full speed as well as arrive at the destination point and stop. Every set contains distance, time passing on Earth and in the spaceship (only relativity approach), expected maximum velocity and corresponding kinetic energy (if you turn on the advanced mode ), and the required fuel mass (see Intergalactic travel – fuel problem section for more information). The notation is:

• a a a — Spaceship acceleration (by default 1   g 1\rm\, g 1 g ). We assume it is positive a > 0 a > 0 a > 0 (at least until halfway) and constant.
• m m m — Spaceship mass. It is required to calculate kinetic energy (and fuel).
• d d d — Distance to the destination. Note that you can select it from the list or type in any other distance to the desired object.
• T T T — Time that passed in a spaceship, or, in other words, how much the crew has aged.
• t t t — Time that passed in a resting frame of reference, e.g., on Earth.
• v v v — Maximum velocity reached by the spaceship.
• K E \rm KE KE — Maximum kinetic energy reached by the spaceship.

The relativistic space travel calculator is dedicated to very long journeys, interstellar or even intergalactic, in which we can neglect the influence of the gravitational field, e.g., from Earth. We didn't include in the destination list our closest celestial bodies, like the Moon or Mars, because it would be pointless. For them, we need different equations that also take into consideration gravitational force.

Newton's universe – arrive at the destination at full speed

It's the simplest case because here, T T T equals t t t for any speed. To calculate the distance covered at constant acceleration during a certain time, you can use the following classical formula:

Since acceleration is constant, and we assume that the initial velocity equals zero, you can estimate the maximum velocity using this equation:

and the corresponding kinetic energy:

Newton's universe – arrive at destination and stop

In this situation, we accelerate to the halfway point, reach maximum velocity, and then decelerate to stop at the destination point. Distance covered during the same time is, as you may expect, smaller than before:

Acceleration remains positive until we're halfway there (then it is negative – deceleration), so the maximum velocity is:

and the kinetic energy equation is the same as the previous one.

Einstein's universe – arrive at the destination at full speed

The relativistic rocket equation has to consider the effects of light-speed travel. These are not only speed limitations and time dilation but also how every length becomes shorter for a moving observer, which is a phenomenon of special relativity called length contraction. If l l l is the proper length observed in the rest frame and L L L is the length observed by a crew in a spaceship, then:

What does it mean? If a spaceship moves with the velocity of v = 0.995 c v = 0.995c v = 0.995 c , then γ = 10 \gamma = 10 γ = 10 , and the length observed by a moving object is ten times smaller than the real length. For example, the distance to the Andromeda Galaxy equals about 2,520,000 light years with Earth as the frame of reference. For a spaceship moving with v = 0.995 c v = 0.995c v = 0.995 c , it will be "only" 252,200 light years away. That's a 90 percent decrease or a 164 percent difference!

Now you probably understand why special relativity allows us to intergalactic travel. Below you can find the relativistic rocket equation for the case in which you want to arrive at the destination point at full speed (without stopping). You can find its derivation in the book by Messrs Misner, Thorne ( Co-Winner of the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics ) and Wheller titled Gravitation , section §6.2. Hyperbolic motion. More accessible formulas are in the mathematical physicist John Baez's article The Relativistic Rocket :

• Time passed on Earth:
• Time passed in the spaceship:
• Maximum velocity:
• Relativistic kinetic energy remains the same:

The symbols sh ⁡ \sh sh , ch ⁡ \ch ch , and th ⁡ \th th are, respectively, sine, cosine, and tangent hyperbolic functions, which are analogs of the ordinary trigonometric functions. In turn, sh ⁡ − 1 \sh^{-1} sh − 1 and ch ⁡ − 1 \ch^{-1} ch − 1 are the inverse hyperbolic functions that can be expressed with natural logarithms and square roots, according to the article Inverse hyperbolic functions on Wikipedia.

Einstein's universe – arrive at destination point and stop

Most websites with relativistic rocket equations consider only arriving at the desired place at full speed. If you want to stop there, you should start decelerating at the halfway point. Below, you can find a set of equations estimating interstellar space travel parameters in the situation when you want to stop at the destination point :

So, after all of these considerations, can humans travel at the speed of light, or at least at a speed close to it? Jet-rocket engines need a lot of fuel per unit of weight of the rocket. You can use our rocket equation calculator to see how much fuel you need to obtain a certain velocity (e.g., with an effective exhaust velocity of 4500 m/s).

Hopefully, future spaceships will be able to produce energy from matter-antimatter annihilation. This process releases energy from two particles that have mass (e.g., electron and positron) into photons. These photons may then be shot out at the back of the spaceship and accelerate the spaceship due to the conservation of momentum. If you want to know how much energy is contained in matter, check out our E = mc² calculator , which is about the famous Albert Einstein equation.

Now that you know the maximum amount of energy you can acquire from matter, it's time to estimate how much of it you need for intergalactic travel. Appropriate formulas are derived from the conservation of momentum and energy principles. For the relativistic case:

where e x e^x e x is an exponential function, and for classical case:

Remember that it assumes 100% efficiency! One of the promising future spaceships' power sources is the fusion of hydrogen into helium, which provides energy of 0.008 mc² . As you can see, in this reaction, efficiency equals only 0.8%.

Let's check whether the fuel mass amount is reasonable for sending a mass of 1 kg to the nearest galaxy. With a space travel calculator, you can find out that, even with 100% efficiency, you would need 5,200 tons of fuel to send only 1 kilogram of your spaceship . That's a lot!

So can humans travel at the speed of light? Right now, it seems impossible, but technology is still developing. For example, a photonic laser thruster is a good candidate since it doesn't require any matter to work, only photons. Infinity and beyond is actually within our reach!

To calculate the time it takes to travel to a specific star or galaxy using the space travel calculator, follow these steps:

• Choose the acceleration : the default mode is 1 g (gravitational field similar to Earth's).
• Enter the spaceship mass , excluding fuel.
• Select the destination : pick the star, planet, galaxy you want to travel to from the dropdown menu.
• The distance between the Earth and your chosen stars will automatically appear. You can also input the distance in light-years directly.
• Define the aim : select whether you aim to " Arrive at destination and stop " or “ Arrive at destination at full speed ”.
• Pick the calculation mode : opt for either " Einstein's universe " mode for relativistic effects or " Newton's universe " for simpler calculations.
• Time passed in spaceship : estimated time experienced by the crew during the journey. (" Einstein's universe " mode)
• Time passed on Earth : estimated time elapsed on Earth during the trip. (" Einstein's universe " mode)
• Time passed : depends on frame of reference, e.g., on Earth. (" Newton's universe " mode)
• Required fuel mass : estimated fuel quantity needed for the journey.
• Maximum velocity : maximum speed achieved by the spaceship.

How long does it take to get to space?

It takes about 8.5 minutes for a space shuttle or spacecraft to reach Earth's orbit, i.e., the limit of space where the Earth's atmosphere ends. This dividing line between the Earth's atmosphere and space is called the Kármán line . It happens so quickly because the shuttle goes from zero to around 17,500 miles per hour in those 8.5 minutes .

How fast does the space station travel?

The International Space Station travels at an average speed of 28,000 km/h or 17,500 mph . In a single day, the ISS can make several complete revolutions as it circumnavigates the globe in just 90 minutes . Placed in orbit at an altitude of 350 km , the station is visible to the naked eye, looking like a dot crossing the sky due to its very bright solar panels.

How do I reach the speed of light?

To reach the speed of light, you would have to overcome several obstacles, including:

Mass limit : traveling at the speed of light would mean traveling at 299,792,458 meters per second. But, thanks to Einstein's theory of relativity, we know that an object with non-zero mass cannot reach this speed.

Energy : accelerating to the speed of light would require infinite energy.

Effects of relativity : from the outside, time would slow down, and you would shrink.

Why can't sound travel in space?

Sound can’t travel in space because it is a mechanical wave that requires a medium to propagate — this medium can be solid, liquid, or gas. In space, there is no matter, or at least not enough for sound to propagate. The density of matter in space is of the order 1 particle per cubic centimeter . While on Earth , it's much denser at around 10 20 particles per cubic centimeter .

Drift velocity

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Everything you need to know about space travel (almost)

We're a long way from home...

Paul Parsons

When did we first start exploring space?

The first human-made object to go into space was a German V2 missile , launched on a test flight in 1942. Although uncrewed, it reached an altitude of 189km (117 miles).

Former Nazi rocket scientists were later recruited by both America and Russia (often at gunpoint in the latter case), where they were instrumental in developing Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) – rockets capable of carrying nuclear weapons from one side of the planet to the other.

It was these super-missiles that formed the basis for the space programmes of both post-war superpowers. As it happened, Russia was the first to reach Earth orbit, when it launched the uncrewed Sputnik 1 in October 1957, followed a month later by Sputnik 2, carrying the dog Laika – the first live animal in space.

The USA sent its first uncrewed satellite, Explorer 1, into orbit soon after, in January 1958. A slew of robotic spaceflights followed, from both sides of the Atlantic, before Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin piloted Vostok 1 into orbit on 12 April 1961, to become the first human being in space . And from there the space race proper began, culminating in Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin becoming the first people to walk on the Moon as part of NASA's Apollo programme .

Why is space travel important?

Space exploration is the future. It satisfies the human urge to explore and to travel, and in the years and decades to come it could even provide our species with new places to call home – especially relevant now, as Earth becomes increasingly crowded .

Extending our reach into space is also necessary for the advancement of science. Space telescopes like the Hubble Space Telescope and probes to the distant worlds of the Solar System are continually updating, and occasionally revolutionising, our understanding of astronomy and physics.

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But there are also some very practical reasons, such as mining asteroids for materials that are extremely rare here on Earth.

One example is the huge reserve of the chemical isotope helium-3 thought to be locked away in the soil on the surface of the Moon . This isotope is a potential fuel for future nuclear fusion reactors – power stations that tap into the same source of energy as the Sun. Unlike other fusion fuels, helium-3 gives off no hard-to-contain and deadly neutron radiation.

However, for this to happen the first challenge to overcome is how to build a base on the Moon. In 2019, China's Chang’e 4 mission marked the beginning of a new space race to conquer the Moon, signalling their intent to build a permanent lunar base , while the NASA Artemis mission plans to build a space station, called Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway , providing a platform to ferry astronauts to the Moon's surface.

Could humans travel into interstellar space and how would we get there?

It’s entirely feasible that human explorers will visit the furthest reaches of our Solar System. The stars, however, are another matter. Interstellar space is so vast that it takes light – the fastest thing we know of in the Universe – years, centuries and millennia to traverse it. Faster-than-light travel may be possible one day, but is unlikely to become a reality in our lifetimes.

It’s not impossible that humans might one day cross this cosmic gulf, though it won’t be easy. The combustion-powered rocket engines of today certainly aren’t up to the job – they just don’t use fuel efficiently enough. Instead, interstellar spacecraft may create a rocket-like propulsion jet using electric and magnetic fields. This so-called ‘ ion drive ’ technology has already been tested aboard uncrewed Solar System probes.

Another possibility is to push spacecraft off towards the stars using the light from a high-powered laser . A consortium of scientists calling themselves Breakthrough Starshot is already planning to send a flotilla of tiny robotic probes to our nearest star, Proxima Centauri, using just this method.

Though whether human astronauts could survive such punishing acceleration, or the decades-long journey through deep space, remains to be seen.

How do we benefit from space exploration?

Pushing forward the frontiers of science is the stated goal of many space missions . But even the development of space travel technology itself can lead to unintended yet beneficial ‘spin-off’ technologies with some very down-to-earth applications.

Notable spin-offs from the US space programme, NASA, include memory foam mattresses, artificial hearts, and the lubricant spray WD-40. Doubtless, there are many more to come.

Read more about space exploration:

• The next giant leaps: The UK missions getting us to the Moon
• Move over, Mars: why we should look further afield for future human colonies
• Everything you need to know about the Voyager mission
• 6 out-of-this-world experiments recreating space on Earth

Space exploration also instils a sense of wonder, it reminds us that there are issues beyond our humdrum planet and its petty squabbles, and without doubt it helps to inspire each new generation of young scientists. It’s also an insurance policy. We’re now all too aware that global calamities can and do happen – for instance, climate change and the giant asteroid that smashed into the Earth 65 million years ago, leading to the total extinction of the dinosaurs .

The lesson for the human species is that we keep all our eggs in one basket at our peril. On the other hand, a healthy space programme, and the means to travel to other worlds, gives us an out.

Is space travel dangerous?

In short, yes – very. Reaching orbit means accelerating up to around 28,000kph (17,000mph, or 22 times the speed of sound ). If anything goes wrong at that speed, it’s seldom good news.

Then there’s the growing cloud of space junk to contend with in Earth's orbit – defunct satellites, discarded rocket stages and other detritus – all moving just as fast. A five-gram bolt hitting at orbital speed packs as much energy as a 200kg weight dropped from the top of an 18-storey building.

And getting to space is just the start of the danger. The principal hazard once there is cancer-producing radiation – the typical dose from one day in space is equivalent to what you’d receive over an entire year back on Earth, thanks to the planet’s atmosphere and protective magnetic field.

Add to that the icy cold airless vacuum , the need to bring all your own food and water, plus the effects of long-duration weightlessness on bone density, the brain and muscular condition – including that of the heart – and it soon becomes clear that venturing into space really isn’t for the faint-hearted.

When will space travel be available to everyone?

It’s already happening – that is, assuming your pockets are deep enough. The first self-funded ‘space tourist’ was US businessman Dennis Tito, who in 2001 spent a week aboard the International Space Station (ISS) for the cool sum of $20m (£15m).

Virgin Galactic has long been promising to take customers on short sub-orbital hops into space – where passengers get to experience rocket propulsion and several minutes of weightlessness, before gliding back to a runway landing on Earth, all for $250k (£190k). In late July 2020, the company unveiled the finished cabin in its SpaceShipTwo vehicle, suggesting that commercial spaceflights may begin shortly.

Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s SpaceX , which in May 2020 became the first private company to launch a human crew to Earth orbit aboard the Crew Dragon , plans to offer stays on the ISS for $35k (£27k) per night. SpaceX is now prototyping its huge Starship vehicle , which is designed to take 100 passengers from Earth to as far afield as Mars for around $20k (£15k) per head. Musk stated in January that he hoped to be operating 1,000 Starships by 2050.

10 Short Lessons in Space Travel by Paul Parsons is out now (£9.99, Michael O'Mara)

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Three ways to travel at (nearly) the speed of light.

Katy Mersmann

1) electromagnetic fields, 2) magnetic explosions, 3) wave-particle interactions.

One hundred years ago today, on May 29, 1919, measurements of a solar eclipse offered verification for Einstein’s theory of general relativity. Even before that, Einstein had developed the theory of special relativity, which revolutionized the way we understand light. To this day, it provides guidance on understanding how particles move through space — a key area of research to keep spacecraft and astronauts safe from radiation.

The theory of special relativity showed that particles of light, photons, travel through a vacuum at a constant pace of 670,616,629 miles per hour — a speed that’s immensely difficult to achieve and impossible to surpass in that environment. Yet all across space, from black holes to our near-Earth environment, particles are, in fact, being accelerated to incredible speeds, some even reaching 99.9% the speed of light.

One of NASA’s jobs is to better understand how these particles are accelerated. Studying these superfast, or relativistic, particles can ultimately help protect missions exploring the solar system, traveling to the Moon, and they can teach us more about our galactic neighborhood: A well-aimed near-light-speed particle can trip onboard electronics and too many at once could have negative radiation effects on space-faring astronauts as they travel to the Moon — or beyond.

Here are three ways that acceleration happens.

Most of the processes that accelerate particles to relativistic speeds work with electromagnetic fields — the same force that keeps magnets on your fridge. The two components, electric and magnetic fields, like two sides of the same coin, work together to whisk particles at relativistic speeds throughout the universe.

In essence, electromagnetic fields accelerate charged particles because the particles feel a force in an electromagnetic field that pushes them along, similar to how gravity pulls at objects with mass. In the right conditions, electromagnetic fields can accelerate particles at near-light-speed.

On Earth, electric fields are often specifically harnessed on smaller scales to speed up particles in laboratories. Particle accelerators, like the Large Hadron Collider and Fermilab, use pulsed electromagnetic fields to accelerate charged particles up to 99.99999896% the speed of light. At these speeds, the particles can be smashed together to produce collisions with immense amounts of energy. This allows scientists to look for elementary particles and understand what the universe was like in the very first fractions of a second after the Big Bang. 

Download related video from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio

Magnetic fields are everywhere in space, encircling Earth and spanning the solar system. They even guide charged particles moving through space, which spiral around the fields.

When these magnetic fields run into each other, they can become tangled. When the tension between the crossed lines becomes too great, the lines explosively snap and realign in a process known as magnetic reconnection. The rapid change in a region’s magnetic field creates electric fields, which causes all the attendant charged particles to be flung away at high speeds. Scientists suspect magnetic reconnection is one way that particles — for example, the solar wind, which is the constant stream of charged particles from the Sun — is accelerated to relativistic speeds.

Those speedy particles also create a variety of side-effects near planets.  Magnetic reconnection occurs close to us at points where the Sun’s magnetic field pushes against Earth’s magnetosphere — its protective magnetic environment. When magnetic reconnection occurs on the side of Earth facing away from the Sun, the particles can be hurled into Earth’s upper atmosphere where they spark the auroras. Magnetic reconnection is also thought to be responsible around other planets like Jupiter and Saturn, though in slightly different ways.

NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale spacecraft were designed and built to focus on understanding all aspects of magnetic reconnection. Using four identical spacecraft, the mission flies around Earth to catch magnetic reconnection in action. The results of the analyzed data can help scientists understand particle acceleration at relativistic speeds around Earth and across the universe.

Particles can be accelerated by interactions with electromagnetic waves, called wave-particle interactions. When electromagnetic waves collide, their fields can become compressed. Charged particles bouncing back and forth between the waves can gain energy similar to a ball bouncing between two merging walls.

These types of interactions are constantly occurring in near-Earth space and are responsible for accelerating particles to speeds that can damage electronics on spacecraft and satellites in space. NASA missions, like the Van Allen Probes , help scientists understand wave-particle interactions.

Wave-particle interactions are also thought to be responsible for accelerating some cosmic rays that originate outside our solar system. After a supernova explosion, a hot, dense shell of compressed gas called a blast wave is ejected away from the stellar core. Filled with magnetic fields and charged particles, wave-particle interactions in these bubbles can launch high-energy cosmic rays at 99.6% the speed of light. Wave-particle interactions may also be partially responsible for accelerating the solar wind and cosmic rays from the Sun.

Download this and related videos in HD formats from NASA Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio

By Mara Johnson-Groh NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center , Greenbelt, Md.

New technology could enable humans to travel at 7 million MPH

At 1 percent the speed of light, it would take a little over a second to get from Los Angeles to New York.

Light is fast . In fact, it is the fastest thing that exists, and a law of the universe is that nothing can move faster than light. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second (300,000 kilometers per second) and can go from the Earth to the Moon in just over a second. Light can streak from Los Angeles to New York in less than the blink of an eye.

While 1 percent of anything doesn’t sound like much, with light, that’s still really fast — close to 7 million miles per hour! At 1 percent the speed of light, it would take a little over a second to get from Los Angeles to New York. This is more than 10,000 times faster than a commercial jet.

The Parker Solar Probe, seen here in an artist’s rendition, is the fastest object ever made by humans and used the gravity of the Sun to get going 0.05% the speed of light.

What is the fastest man-made object

Bullets can go 2,600 miles per hour (mph), more than three times the speed of sound. The fastest aircraft is NASA’s X3 jet plane , with a top speed of 7,000 mph. That sounds impressive, but it’s still only 0.001 percent the speed of light.

The fastest human-made objects are spacecraft. They use rockets to break free of the Earth’s gravity, which takes a speed of 25,000 mph. The spacecraft that is traveling the fastest is NASA’s Parker Solar Probe . After it launched from Earth in 2018, it skimmed the Sun’s scorching atmosphere and used the Sun’s gravity to reach 330,000 mph. That’s blindingly fast — yet only 0.05% of the speed of light.

Why even 1 percent of light speed is hard

What’s holding humanity back from reaching 1 percent of the speed of light? In a word, energy. Any object that’s moving has energy due to its motion. Physicists call this kinetic energy. To go faster, you need to increase kinetic energy. The problem is that it takes a lot of kinetic energy to increase speed. To make something go twice as fast takes four times the energy. Making something go three times as fast requires nine times the energy, and so on.

For example, to get a teenager who weighs 110 pounds to 1 percent of the speed of light would cost 200 trillion Joules (a measurement of energy). That’s roughly the same amount of energy that 2 million people in the U.S. use in a day.

Light sails like these seen in an illustration could get us to the stars.

How fast can we go?

It’s possible to get something to 1 percent the speed of light, but it would just take an enormous amount of energy. Could humans make something go even faster?

Yes! But engineers need to figure out new ways to make things move in space. All rockets, even the sleek new rockets used by SpaceX and Blue Origins, burn rocket fuel that isn’t very different from gasoline in a car. The problem is that burning fuel is very inefficient.

Other methods for pushing a spacecraft involve using electric or magnetic forces . Nuclear fusion , the process that powers the Sun, is also much more efficient than chemical fuel.

Scientists are researching many other ways to go fast — even warp drives , the faster-than-light travel popularized by Star Trek .

One promising way to get something moving very fast is to use a solar sail. These are large, thin sheets of plastic attached to a spacecraft and designed so that sunlight can push on them, like the wind in a normal sail. A few spacecraft have used solar sails to show that they work, and scientists think that a solar sail could propel spacecraft to 10 percent of the speed of light .

One day, when humanity is not limited to a tiny fraction of the speed of light, we might travel to the stars .

This article was originally published on The Conversation by Chris Impey. Read the original article here.

This article was originally published on November 22, 2021

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What is the speed of light? Here’s the history, discovery of the cosmic speed limit

On one hand, the speed of light is just a number: 299,792,458 meters per second. And on the other, it’s one of the most important constants that appears in nature and defines the relationship of causality itself.

As far as we can measure, it is a constant. It is the same speed for every observer in the entire universe. This constancy was first established in the late 1800’s with the experiments of Albert Michelson and Edward Morley at Case Western Reserve University . They attempted to measure changes in the speed of light as the Earth orbited around the Sun. They found no such variation, and no experiment ever since then has either.

Observations of the cosmic microwave background, the light released when the universe was 380,000 years old, show that the speed of light hasn’t measurably changed in over 13.8 billion years.

In fact, we now define the speed of light to be a constant, with a precise speed of 299,792,458 meters per second. While it remains a remote possibility in deeply theoretical physics that light may not be a constant, for all known purposes it is a constant, so it’s better to just define it and move on with life.

How was the speed of light first measured?

In 1676 the Danish astronomer Ole Christensen Romer made the first quantitative measurement of how fast light travels. He carefully observed the orbit of Io, the innermost moon of Jupiter. As the Earth circles the Sun in its own orbit, sometimes it approaches Jupiter and sometimes it recedes away from it. When the Earth is approaching Jupiter, the path that light has to travel from Io is shorter than when the Earth is receding away from Jupiter. By carefully measuring the changes to Io’s orbital period, Romer calculated a speed of light of around 220,000 kilometers per second.

Observations continued to improve until by the 19 th century astronomers and physicists had developed the sophistication to get very close to the modern value. In 1865, James Clerk Maxwell made a remarkable discovery. He was investigating the properties of electricity and magnetism, which for decades had remained mysterious in unconnected laboratory experiments around the world. Maxwell found that electricity and magnetism were really two sides of the same coin, both manifestations of a single electromagnetic force.

As Maxwell explored the consequences of his new theory, he found that changing magnetic fields can lead to changing electric fields, which then lead to a new round of changing magnetic fields. The fields leapfrog over each other and can even travel through empty space. When Maxwell went to calculate the speed of these electromagnetic waves, he was surprised to see the speed of light pop out – the first theoretical calculation of this important number.

What is the most precise measurement of the speed of light?

Because it is defined to be a constant, there’s no need to measure it further. The number we’ve defined is it, with no uncertainty, no error bars. It’s done. But the speed of light is just that – a speed. The number we choose to represent it depends on the units we use: kilometers versus miles, seconds versus hours, and so on. In fact, physicists commonly just set the speed of light to be 1 to make their calculations easier. So instead of trying to measure the speed light travels, physicists turn to more precisely measuring other units, like the length of the meter or the duration of the second. In other words, the defined value of the speed of light is used to establish the length of other units like the meter.

How does light slow down?

Yes, the speed of light is always a constant. But it slows down whenever it travels through a medium like air or water. How does this work? There are a few different ways to present an answer to this question, depending on whether you prefer a particle-like picture or a wave-like picture.

In a particle-like picture, light is made of tiny little bullets called photons. All those photons always travel at the speed of light, but as light passes through a medium those photons get all tangled up, bouncing around among all the molecules of the medium. This slows down the overall propagation of light, because it takes more time for the group of photons to make it through.

In a wave-like picture, light is made of electromagnetic waves. When these waves pass through a medium, they get all the charged particles in motion, which in turn generate new electromagnetic waves of their own. These interfere with the original light, forcing it to slow down as it passes through.

Either way, light always travels at the same speed, but matter can interfere with its travel, making it slow down.

Why is the speed of light important?

The speed of light is important because it’s about way more than, well, the speed of light. In the early 1900’s Einstein realized just how special this speed is. The old physics, dominated by the work of Isaac Newton, said that the universe had a fixed reference frame from which we could measure all motion. This is why Michelson and Morley went looking for changes in the speed, because it should change depending on our point of view. But their experiments showed that the speed was always constant, so what gives?

Einstein decided to take this experiment at face value. He assumed that the speed of light is a true, fundamental constant. No matter where you are, no matter how fast you’re moving, you’ll always see the same speed.

This is wild to think about. If you’re traveling at 99% the speed of light and turn on a flashlight, the beam will race ahead of you at…exactly the speed of light, no more, no less. If you’re coming from the opposite direction, you’ll still also measure the exact same speed.

This constancy forms the basis of Einstein’s special theory of relativity, which tells us that while all motion is relative – different observers won’t always agree on the length of measurements or the duration of events – some things are truly universal, like the speed of light.

Can you go faster than light speed?

Nope. Nothing can. Any particle with zero mass must travel at light speed. But anything with mass (which is most of the universe) cannot. The problem is relativity. The faster you go, the more energy you have. But we know from Einstein’s relativity that energy and mass are the same thing. So the more energy you have, the more mass you have, which makes it harder for you to go even faster. You can get as close as you want to the speed of light, but to actually crack that barrier takes an infinite amount of energy. So don’t even try.

How is the speed at which light travels related to causality?

If you think you can find a cheat to get around the limitations of light speed, then I need to tell you about its role in special relativity. You see, it’s not just about light. It just so happens that light travels at this special speed, and it was the first thing we discovered to travel at this speed. So it could have had another name. Indeed, a better name for this speed might be “the speed of time.”

Related: Is time travel possible? An astrophysicist explains

We live in a universe of causes and effects. All effects are preceded by a cause, and all causes lead to effects. The speed of light limits how quickly causes can lead to effects. Because it’s a maximum speed limit for any motion or interaction, in a given amount of time there’s a limit to what I can influence. If I want to tap you on the shoulder and you’re right next to me, I can do it right away. But if you’re on the other side of the planet, I have to travel there first. The motion of me traveling to you is limited by the speed of light, so that sets how quickly I can tap you on the shoulder – the speed light travels dictates how quickly a single cause can create an effect.

The ability to go faster than light would allow effects to happen before their causes. In essence, time travel into the past would be possible with faster-than-light travel. Since we view time as the unbroken chain of causes and effects going from the past to the future, breaking the speed of light would break causality, which would seriously undermine our sense of the forward motion of time.

Why does light travel at this speed?

No clue. It appears to us as a fundamental constant of nature. We have no theory of physics that explains its existence or why it has the value that it does. We hope that a future understanding of nature will provide this explanation, but right now all investigations are purely theoretical. For now, we just have to take it as a given.

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A cosmic 'speed camera' just revealed the staggering speed of neutron star jets in a world first

by James Miller-Jones, The Conversation

How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it turns out, is about one-third the speed of light, as our team has just revealed in a new study published in Nature .

Energetic cosmic beams known as jets are seen throughout our universe. They are launched when material—mainly dust and gas—falls in towards any dense central object, such as a neutron star (an extremely dense remnant of a once-massive star) or a black hole .

The jets carry away some of the gravitational energy released by the infalling gas, recycling it back into the surroundings on far larger scales.

The most powerful jets in the universe come from the biggest black holes at the centers of galaxies. The energy output of these jets can affect the evolution of an entire galaxy, or even a galaxy cluster. This makes jets a critical, yet intriguing, component of our universe.

Although jets are common, we still don't fully understand how they are launched. Measuring the jets from a neutron star has now given us valuable information.

Jets from stellar corpses

Jets from black holes tend to be bright, and have been well studied. However, the jets from neutron stars are typically much fainter, and much less is known about them.

This presents a problem, since we can learn a lot by comparing the jets launched by different celestial objects. Neutron stars are extremely dense stellar corpses—cosmic cinders the size of a city, yet containing the mass of a star. We can think of them as enormous atomic nuclei, each about 20 kilometers across.

In contrast to black holes, neutron stars have both a solid surface and a magnetic field , and gas falling onto them releases less gravitational energy . All of these properties will have an effect on how their jets are launched, making studies of neutron star jets particularly valuable.

One key clue to how jets are launched comes from their speeds. If we can determine how jet speeds vary with the mass or spin of the neutron star, that would provide a powerful test of theoretical predictions. But it is extremely challenging to measure jet speeds accurately enough for such a test.

A cosmic speed camera

When we measure speeds on Earth, we time an object between two points. This could be a 100-meter sprinter running down the track, or a point-to-point speed camera tracking a car.

Our team, led by Thomas Russell from the Italian National Institute of Astrophysics in Palermo, conducted a new experiment to do this for neutron star jets.

What has made this measurement so difficult in the past is that jets are steady flows. This means there is no single starting point for our timer. But we were able to identify a short-lived signal at X-ray wavelengths that we could use as our "starting gun."

Being so dense, neutron stars can "steal" matter from a nearby orbiting companion star. While some of that gas is launched outwards as jets, most of it ends up falling onto the neutron star. As the material piles up, it gets hotter and denser.

When enough material has built up, it triggers a thermonuclear explosion. A runaway nuclear fusion reaction occurs and rapidly spreads to engulf the entire star. The fusion lasts for a few seconds to minutes, causing a short-lived burst of X-rays .

One step closer to solving a mystery

We thought this thermonuclear explosion would disrupt the neutron star's jets. So, we used CSIRO's Australia Telescope Compact Array to stare at the jets for three days at radio wavelengths to try and catch the disruption. At the same time, we used the European Space Agency's Integral telescope to look at the X-rays from the system.

To our surprise, we found the jets got brighter after every pulse of X-rays. Instead of disrupting the jets, the thermonuclear explosions seemed to power them up. And this pattern was repeated ten times in one neutron star system, and then again in a second system.

We can explain this surprising result if the X-ray pulse causes gas swirling around the neutron star to fall inwards more quickly. This, in turn, provides more energy and material to divert into the jets.

Most importantly, however, we can use the X-ray burst to indicate the launch time of the jets. We timed how long they took to move outwards to where they became visible at two different radio wavelengths. These start and finish points provided us with our cosmic speed camera.

Interestingly, the jet speed we measured was close to the "escape speed" from a neutron star. On Earth, this escape speed is 11.2 kilometers per second —what rockets need to achieve to break free of Earth's gravity. For a neutron star, that value is around half the speed of light .

Our work has introduced a new technique for measuring neutron star jet speeds. Our next steps will be to see how the jet speed changes for neutron stars with different masses and rotation rates. That will allow us to directly test theoretical models , taking us one step closer to figuring out how such powerful cosmic jets are launched.

Journal information: Nature

Provided by The Conversation

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Rhett Allain

How Fast Do Spacecraft Travel in The Expanse ?

Maybe you thought my previous post on the crushing g-force of the Epstein drive from The Expanse would be the end of that. Wrong. This is such great clip, I have to do more.

In case you missed it, let me tell you what's going on. This guy has a spaceship near Mars (maybe in orbit) and he is playing around with some modifications to his fusion drive, giving the spaceship super thrust while using very little fuel. The clip doesn't end well for the guy, but it's the start of a new drive—the Epstein drive. This more powerful spaceship propulsion allows ships to travel around the solar system and gives us the whole plot of The Expanse .

So, what kind of questions can be answered from this clip? Note that I am just going by evidence from the video. I'm not going to use stuff from the book ( The Expanse by James S.A. Corey) the show is based on. Here are some things to consider:

• How fast does the spaceship end up going?
• What is the maximum acceleration?
• How long would the fuel last?
• How far does it travel?

Let's just jump right into this. The scene includes a shot of the spaceship control panel. This display shows the time, speed, acceleration, and percent fuel remaining. The acceleration is measured in "g's" where 1 g = 9.8 m/s 2 . For the speed, it's measured in "MPS" which I am going to assume means meters per second (but I can check this).

During that first intial thrust, I can get speed and acceleration as a function of time (by looking at each frame). Here is a plot of speed vs. time ( and here is the data in plot.ly ).

Makena Kelly

Geek's Guide to the Galaxy

Henri Robbins

Acceleration is defined as the rate of change of velocity. So, for a plot of velocity vs time (just the velocity in one direction) the slope of the line will be the acceleration. From this graph, we can see two things. First, the speed increases at a linear rate as you would expect from a constant acceleration. Yes, the acceleration does indeed change in the first shot—but not by much (just 3.12 to 3.18). Second, the slope of the line gives an acceleration of 83.517 m/s 2 (assuming the "m" in the speed is meters). Just for comparison, an acceleration of 3.15 g's would be 30.87 m/s 2 .

OK, so we have a problem (yes, I know this is a science fiction show and not meant to be analyzed). Is the acceleration displayed incorrectly? Is the speed incorrect? Maybe the units for speed aren't meters per second? In order to proceed, I want to keep the acceleration at 3.15 g's—that means I'm going to have to fix the speed. The simplest way is to call the "M" in MPS something other than meters. Let me start by finding the conversion between meters and M (whatever that stands for). I can set the two accelerations equal to each other and solve for M.

I will call M the Martian-meter. It's shorter than an Earth-meter. Oh wait! What if the acceleration is not 3.15 Earth-g's but 3.15 Martian g's? The gravitational field on the surface of Mars is 3.71 N/kg (3.71 m/s 2 ) which would mean that 3.15 g's would be an acceleration of 11.7 m/s 2 . That's not good. That makes the acceleration in the clip in greater disagreement with the change in velocity. OK, I'm going with the Martian-meter idea (and I'm sticking to that).

The next time the scene shows the control panel is at a "run time" of 2 minutes and 12 seconds. The acceleration is listed at 4.28 g's. If I record the rate the speed changes again, it's very linear with an acceleration of 617.07 M/s 2 (notice that I am using Martian-meters) or 228.3 m/s 2 (Earth-meters). Converting the acceleration on the panel, I get 4.28 g's equal to 41.94 m/s 2 . OK, here is a news flash. I don't think the numbers really mean anything except that they are increasing at a linear rate.

Now for a comment. As someone who consults shows regarding science content, I suspect I know how this happened. Some science person calculated the speed so that it agrees with the 4.28 g acceleration. Next the special effects people made a program that displays the calculated speed on the readout in the scene. Finally, a producer or director looked at the rough cut and said "Hey, that doesn't look very fast. Can we make the speed change even more?" Boom, the display is different. And really, I'm OK with this—they are trying to tell a story and emphasize the huge acceleration. Who would really check that stuff anyway? Oh, that's right—me.

But wait! It gets even worse. If you measure the acceleration based on the changing speed, it gets high—very high. At the end of the clip, the spacecraft is traveling around 25 million meters per second and has an acceleration of about 46,119 m/s 2 . That's the equivalent of 4,700 g's. Boom.

Of course, it's all for a visual effect. If you want to show the spacecraft at crazy high speeds, a normal acceleration wouldn't look very impressive with just the last few digits changing. It would give the sense that it's not really accelerating (even though it is).

This is what you want. You want to know how fast this ship ends up going after it runs out of fuel. OK, I've got you covered. However, I don't know everything so I'm going to have to guess at some stuff. Here are my estimations.

• The spaceship starts with a speed of 5,500 m/s (yes, I'm assuming the mps means meters per second).
• There is a constant acceleration of 10 g's (98 m/s 2 ). This wouldn't quite be true if the mass of the spaceship significantly decreased as it used fuel—but it's still a fine place to start.
• There are no other significant gravitational objects around to influence its motion.
• The burn-rate for the fuel is constant. This means that it went from 89.9 percent to 89.1 percent in four hours.

Let's get started. The first thing to determine is the total burn time. If it uses up 0.8 percent in four hours, it would take about 450 hours to run out of fuel (that's almost 19 days). Next I can use the acceleration and time to find the final velocity (based on the definition of acceleration).

Using my values (need to put in the time in seconds), I get a velocity that's about half the speed of light (3 x 10 8 m/s)—so, this method won't work. Instead, I would need to use the relativistic definition of momentum:

Right—you don't want to do that since the math gets a bit tricker (you also need to use the momentum principle). Let's just say the final speed is super fast. Super, super fast. I will leave the actual calculation as a homework question.

Let me add one more thing for you to consider. How would you measure the speed in a spacecraft anyway? If you are thinking about the speed measurement for a car or airplane, it seems pretty straightforward. A car just measures the rotation rate of the tires and then uses that to calculate the speed. An airplane can measure the change in pressure due to the air moving past the wing to get the speed. But what about in space? There is nothing moving past the spacecraft to use for a speed measurement. Instead, you would have to calculate the speed based on the acceleration. Yes, that's what you would do.

• Use the momentum principle along with relativistic momentum to calculate the final velocity of the spacecraft.
• What is the kinetic energy of the spacecraft at the end of the rocket burn? If you assume all this energy came from the fusion process, how much fuel (mass) did it use? Hint: use the E = mc^2 to calculate the mass.
• Make a rough approximation of the mass of the spacecraft and the rocket equation to estimate the total mass of fuel in the rocket along with the exhaust speed.
• How far did the spacecraft travel during this burn? You can use non-relativistic kinematics if you like.
• The starting speed of the spacecraft is listed at 5500 m/s. Assuming it is in orbit around Mars, how high above the surface would it be?
• What if the spacecraft has a more reasonable acceleration—like around 1 g? How fast would it be traveling at the end of the burn?
• Suppose you want to measure the speed of the spacecraft based on the change in angular size of Mars as you move away. In the first hour, what would be the change in angular size of Mars?
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How Fast Do Rockets Travel In Space?

If you’re curious about how fast rockets travel to reach in space, you are not alone. Space technology has come a long way in the last few decades. And more people are interested to learn about it than ever before.

Rockets are essential to space travel , allowing us to explore new worlds and discover further information about our universe. In this blog post, we’ll answer the question, “how fast do rockets travel to reach in space?”

What is the speed of a rocket in space and how is it measured?

Space travel has been a desired topic for centuries. And only in the last few decades has it become a reality for ordinary people. One of the essential technologies that make space tourism possible is rocket propulsion. Rockets can reach high speeds by ejecting large amounts of hot gas. The speed of a rocket can be measured by its exhaust velocity.

The exhaust velocity is the speed at which the gas exits the rocket’s nozzle. Exhaust velocity is usually calculated in kilometers per second (km/s). Spacecraft that use rocket propulsion usually have exhaust velocities of 2-4 km/s, which means they can travel from Earth to low Earth orbit in just a few minutes.

The speed of a rocket in space is quite fast, but it can alter depending on the mission or destination. For example, a rocket headed to the International Space Station would need to travel much slower than one headed for Mars . The speed of a rocket is also measured in miles per hour (mph). For example, the fastest Space Shuttle typically traveled around 17,500 km/h (10,860 mph) when in orbit.

Rocket propulsion is also used for other applications such as satellite launches and space exploration. The Space Shuttle , for example, has an exhaust velocity of around 4.5 km/s.

In contrast, chemical rockets used for blastoff typically have exhaust velocities of 5-8 km/s.

As Space Technology advances, we can wish to see even higher speeds attained by rockets in the future. One day we can even travel to other planets using this fantastic technology!

How does the speed of a rocket change in different environments (vacuum vs atmosphere)?

While early rocket experiments were restricted to suborbital flights , modern space technology has made it travel much farther and faster.

However, the speed of a rocket is not steady, and it varies depending on the environment in which it operates. A rocket can reach very high speeds due to the lack of air resistance in a vacuum, like in outer space .

But, in an atmosphere like Earth, the air resistance slows down the rocket’s speed. As a result, rockets are typically directed into space from Earth using powerful boosters that enable them to overcome the atmosphere’s drag.

Once the rocket reaches space, it can accelerate to much higher speeds. Space tourism is a rapidly growing industry, and trips to outer space are becoming increasingly popular. With advances in space technology, it is now feasible for people to experience the bliss of rocket travel.

What factors affect the speed of a rocket launch (weight, propellant, altitude)?

Many factors affect the speed of a rocket launch.

• One is the weight of the rocket. The heavier the rocket, the more fuel is needed to achieve lift-off.
• Another factor is the sort of propellant (fuel) used. Solid fuel rockets are faster than liquid-fuel rockets because they can ignite more quickly.
• Finally, altitude can also impact launch speed. Rockets launched from higher altitudes will achieve more incredible speeds due to the thinner atmosphere.

Space technology has come a long way in recent years, making it possible to launch rockets with incredible speed and accuracy. This has made space travel more accessible and opened up new exploration and industry opportunities. All of these factors must be considered when planning a rocket launch.

The Fastest Crewed Mission

Space technology has arrived a long way in the last century. Crewed missions to space were once believed to be a far-off dream, but now they are a reality. And with technological advances, these missions are evolving faster and more efficiently.

The fastest crewed mission was the Space Shuttle Columbia, which completed a round-trip to space in just over two days. This mission was achievable due to advanced propulsion systems and new materials that let the shuttle travel at high speeds.

While this mission was especially for scientific research , it also laid the groundwork for future space tourism and travel . Space flight is no longer just for government astronauts and scientists; it is now available to anyone who desires to explore. And as the industry continues to evolve, we hope for even faster and more efficient crewed missions to become a reality.

What are some of the challenges associated with traveling at high speeds in space?

Even with our current technology, space travel is even fraught with challenges. One of the biggest challenges is simply traveling at high speeds in space. The fuel needed to propel a spacecraft to such high velocities is fantastic, and the tiniest miscalculation can result in disaster.

In addition, the human body is not created to resist the G-forces associated with space travel. Astronauts must undergo intense physical training before launching a space flight, and even then, they are at risk of long-term health problems.

Space tourism is another challenge associated with high-speed space travel. As the industry evolves, there will be an increasing need for flights to famous destinations like the Moon and Mars .

However, the cost of flights will likely be prohibitive for most people, making them unavailable to all but the wealthiest individuals. Ultimately, high-speed space travel remains an exciting but challenging prospect that will continue to inspire scientists and dreamers for years to come.

What are some future applications for rockets that travel at high speeds?

Rockets have already transformed how we travel and explore Space and our planet. In the future, they may become an even more essential part of our lives as we continue to stretch the boundaries of what is doable.

One potential application for high-speed rockets is Space tourism. Imagine being able to take a flight into Space, or even to another world, in a subject of hours. This would open up a new world of chances for vacationers and make Space travel more obtainable to the general public.

Rockets may also utilize to transport goods and materials faster around the globe. With rocket-powered flight, we could reduce travel time for both people and cargo, making it possible to get from one side of the world to the other in hours. This would significantly impact the economy and could guide to a more connected global community.

As we continue to develop new technology, we will likely find even more uses for high-speed rockets. They could become commonplace in space exploration and terrestrial travel, making it possible to reach new heights and explore our universe like never before.

How will new technologies help us to explore deep space and beyond?

With new technologies, we can now explore deep space and even further what we once thought possible. Space tourism is now a reality, with companies like Virgin Galactic providing trips to space.

Space flight is also becoming more achievable with the development of SpaceShipTwo and other commercial spacecraft . These new technologies are not only opening up the chance of space travel for people but also opening up new options for exploration and research.

The space industry is predicted to grow significantly in the next few years, and new technologies will play a significant role in this growth. With the help of such technologies, we will be capable of exploring the universe in ways that were once impossible.

Rockets are essential to space exploration and have been used for centuries to help us explore our universe. As technology enhances, we continue to find new and innovative ways to use rockets to push us further into space.

With the advent of high-speed travel, we can explore regions of space that were once inaccessible. In the future, we will continue to rely on rockets as our primary mode of transportation for deep space exploration and beyond.

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A No-Fuss Guide To Starfield Space Travel

Four layers of maps, charting course, grav drives…it can all be a bit much for a budding space traveler.

With a scope possibly larger than anything Bethesda has done before, Starfield can be a little overwhelming to navigate on your first trip around the stars. With a map that’s four levels deep, and more than a couple of unconventional menu navigation options, it’s not very hard to simply get lost in the interface before you ever get lost out in the void.

Read More: Help! I’m Trapped In Starfield ’s Menus And Can’t Get Out Buy Starfield : Amazon | Best Buy | Ga meStop

This guide will help you understand how Starfield ’s map system works, and offer some tips and tricks for navigating it—and by extension the galaxy—faster. At the end, there are also some options for a more immersive experience that doesn’t rely on menu and map diving quite as much.

How to unlock fast travel in specific areas

At first, it might seem like you need to constantly go into orbit around a planet to go straight to a specific destination. Fortunately, once you’ve visited a city or specific location on a planet, there’s a way to navigate to it from almost anywhere (although some areas like dungeons don’t let you fast travel out of them, not too dissimilar to how fast travel worked in Bethesda’s previous games).

And you don’t need to go into a menu to fast travel either. On a planet’s surface, simply open up your scanner with LB on controller (or F on keyboard), point your reticle to any area you’ve previously visited, and hit A on gamepad (or E on keyboard) to get the prompt for fast travel.

To immediately travel to a specific location on a given planet, simply navigate to it with the A button (or Left Click on a mouse) on the starmap until you see the prompt to hold X button (or key) to land. Remember that you must’ve visited a location at least once before you can fast travel this way.

Basic space and map navigation

Starfield features four levels of maps. The most immediate is your surface map, a somewhat-lacking and simplistic layout of what points of interest are around you. It’s not terribly useful, but you can select previously visited locales from this menu and fast travel to them pretty quickly. You can quickly access the surface map by opening your scanner with LB (or F key) and then hitting RB (or G key).

Read More: Starfield ’s Local Planet Map Is Horrible

The next level up from there is the planet map. You can get to this map instantly by holding the menu button (or Tab on keyboard) . From this view you can pick specific locales indicated by an icon, or select just about anywhere on the planet to land and see what awaits you.

After the planet map, there’s the system map. This shows you all the planets, moons, and space stations in a given star system. Simply choose a location from this area to set a course or land instantly if you’ve previously visited the area.

The final map layer is the galaxy map. Here you can view all star systems available in Starfield . You’ll chart courses to new systems from this map view. If a given star system is too far for your current grav drive to reach, you’ll either need to upgrade your ship and invest skill points in the Astrophysics perk, or navigate to a closer star system to get yourself within range.

When traveling to a space station, you’ll need to manually fly up to it to dock. Be sure to target the space station by hitting A (or the E key) when close. You can dock by holding X (or the R key) once you’re under 500 meters away from the station , so no need to worry about damaging your ship by getting too close. Once you dock, you can hold the X button or key to immediately board instead of needing to walk to the back of your ship. Likewise, when returning to your ship, you can hold X (or the R key) at the space station’s exit to go straight to your cockpit.

How to fast travel to mission objectives quickly

Some quests in Starfield will task you with hopping to a few different locations. If you want to immediately locate where your next objective is on the starmap, simply navigate to your quest log by hitting the menu button (Tab on keyboard) and selecting the lower portion of the radial wheel. (You can also access your missions by hitting the view button from the star map.) Once you select a specific mission, you can hit Y on gamepad (B key on keyboard) to have the map automatically locate where in the galaxy your next objective is.

Immersive space travel

If this is all too much menu diving for your space travels, you can choose to avoid most maps and menus to reach any given location. While traveling from point A to B by simply flying is technically possible, it’s not very ideal. Instead, from your ship’s cockpit, look around until you see an icon for a specific destination. Press A when you spot where you want to go and you’ll be given an option to hold X (or the R key) to travel there.

You can navigate to almost any planet in a star system this way, as well as to other star systems. If the place you’re going is a mission objective, you’ll see “Mission” written under the icon. And when jumping between star systems, the more power you give your grav drive by way of the power icons in the lower left HUD of the cockpit view, the quicker your drive will spin up.

You’re not alone if you found Starfield ’s navigation a little intimidating at first. Fortunately, once you spend enough time cruising among the stars, you’ll build up a muscle memory for quickly diving in and out of the menus, or avoiding them altogether.

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How Fast Can We Travel in Space With Current Technology?

So, are you a fan of sci-fi movies or TV shows? Are you interested in complex physics and love the idea of traveling to distant planets and galaxies? Does the prospect of interstellar travel make you excited? Many of us dream of a future in which humans can travel anywhere in the universe. Thankfully, that future is only getting closer.

Recently, space travel technology has seen a boom in funding and innovation. Elon Musk and his team at SpaceX keep breaking record after record. Other billionaires, including Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson, are also trying to build better, cheaper, and faster rockets. This competition has come to be known as the “Billionaire Space Race.”  

What’s the Fastest Thing We’ve Sent Into Space?

What you’re probably wondering is how fast we’ve been able to travel in space so far. Answering this question is actually more complicated than you might think. The correct answer depends on whether you’re referring to manned or unmanned rockets and spacecraft. Generally, uncrewed spaceships can travel at a much greater speed than crewed ones. That’s because they are lighter and are not intended to take safety measures into account.

The Fastest Spacecraft

On the 12th of August 2018, NASA launched the Parker Solar Probe into space aboard the United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket. The probe will circle Venus 7 times, using the planet’s gravitational field to slingshot itself towards the Sun. By 2024, it’s projected to reach a maximum speed of 430,000 mph (692,000 km/h).

As of the 27th of September 2020, the Parker Solar Probe has already accelerated to a speed of 289,927 mph (466,592 km/h) relative to the Sun, officially becoming the fastest spacecraft to date. Sometime in 2025, it will also become the first human-made object to “touch” the Sun, getting only 6.9 million km or 4.3 million miles away from the star’s center.

The Fastest Crewed Mission

Surprisingly, the fastest manned mission record still belongs to Apollo 10, which took place back in May 1969. During its return from the Moon, the crew’s vehicle reached a speed of 24,791 mph (39,897 km/h). This mission’s success enabled Apollo 11 to land on the Moon just a few months later.

SpaceX and the Journey to Mars

On the 4th of March 2021, SpaceX’s Starship completed its third high-altitude flight test, following two previous tests during which the prototypes crashed and exploded at landing. Although it’s currently far from being able to complete a journey into outer space, the Starship will supposedly be able to reach Mars someday.

The Starship’s final model will require six rocket engines and a separate rocket booster called the Super Heavy to reach orbit. These will enable it to develop a speed of over 17,000 mph (approximately 27,000 km/h). 

SpaceX’s CEO Elon Musk has stated that he intends to get humans on Mars by 2026. The audacious journey will take somewhere between six and eight months to complete. The Starship will need to reach around 25,000 mph (approximately 40,000 km/h) and escape Earth’s gravitational pull to reach the planet. If that happens, the first manned mission to Mars will likely break Apollo 10’s long-standing record.

One More Thing

Although we don’t know when humans will set foot on Mars, one thing is certain: we live in exciting times. However, having to wait for the next breakthrough in space travel is boring, so why not have some fun while you’re doing it? Check out the best Playtech casinos and try your luck at some of the most popular online games. You might win a special prize that will take you to the Moon!

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How fast will April's total solar eclipse travel?

During the total solar eclipse on April 8, the moon's shadow will slow down and then speed up again.

Understanding the moon's shadow

Distance and speed of the moon, why it slows down and speeds up.

When the moon's shadow races across Earth on April 8 during the total solar eclipse, it will travel faster than the speed of sound.

It will sweep across Earth at more than 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) per hour on April 8, according to NASA . 

However, exactly how fast it will move will depend on where you are viewing it from. 

Related: Total solar eclipse 2024: Everything you need to know

A solar eclipse occurs on Earth when a new moon blocks at least part of the sun, as seen from Earth. All solar eclipses project a large fuzzy shadow onto Earth called the penumbra. From within it, observers see a partial solar eclipse, watching the moon gradually block some of the sun before gradually moving away. 

Only during a total solar eclipse , when the moon blocks all of the sun , does a smaller, darker conical shadow called the umbra project onto Earth. This is the path of totality, and from within it, observers see partial phases on either side of a total solar eclipse.

The width of the umbra (the path of totality) and the penumbra (the partial eclipse zone) depend on the moon's distance from Earth during the eclipse. This also affects the speed at which the shadow moves, as does the rotational speed of the moon and the Earth. The moon is orbiting Earth from west to east, the same way Earth rotates, but the moon moves more quickly. 

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The penumbral and umbral shadows of the moon are projected as a path because Earth rotates under the faster-moving shadow of the moon. So, although the moon's shadow moves across Earth very quickly during an eclipse, it's counteracted by the Earth's rotational speed. 

Although the moon's shadow would move even more quickly across the planet if it weren't rotating, on April 8, that shadow will still move exceptionally fast. However, it won't travel at a consistent speed. 

"The moon's shadow will travel slowest at the point of greatest eclipse near the town of Nazas, Mexico, where the duration is longest and also where the shadow speed is the lowest," said Michael Zeiler, eclipse cartographer at GreatAmericanEclipse.com . "As the shadow progresses across North America, the shadow speed increases because the oblique angle of the shadow on a curved Earth results in a higher ground speed." 

For example, at 11:37 UT on April 8, the event will begin as an eclipsed sunrise in the Pacific Ocean, during which the moon's shadow will be traveling at a whopping 10,439,792 mph (16,801,217 kph), according to eclipse expert Xavier Jubier's Interactive Google Map of the eclipse.

As it ends as an eclipsed sunset in the Atlantic, it will be traveling at 5,535,176 mph (8,908,002 kph). However, close to Nazas, Mexico — the point of the greatest eclipse where the centers of the sun, moon, and Earth are in perfect synergy (alignment) — it will be moving at a pedestrian 1,565 mph (2,519 kph). The shadow will slow down to that point and speed up after, so as the moon's shadow enters the U.S. in Texas, it will speed up slightly to 1,597 mph (2,570 kph). It will then pick up the pace across the U.S. and, as it leaves Newfoundland in Canada for the Atlantic, it will be moving at 4,727 mph (7,607 kph). 

April's total solar eclipse will travel at speeds ranging from 10 million miles an hour — half the speed of the fastest supernova explosion ever detected — to as slow as 1,565 mph, about twice the speed of a supersonic aircraft. Just ensure you're inside the path of totality to stand beneath it! 

Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: [email protected].

Jamie is an experienced science, technology and travel journalist and stargazer who writes about exploring the night sky, solar and lunar eclipses, moon-gazing, astro-travel, astronomy and space exploration. He is the editor of  WhenIsTheNextEclipse.com  and author of  A Stargazing Program For Beginners , and is a senior contributor at Forbes. His special skill is turning tech-babble into plain English.

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How Fast Can We Travel in Space with Current Technology? Pushing the Boundaries

Ever since the dawn of the Space Age with the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957 , humanity has been captivated by the prospect of exploring the cosmos. The subsequent years witnessed remarkable achievements, such as Yuri Gagarin becoming the first human in space in 1961 , the Apollo 11 Moon landing in 1969 , and the ongoing presence of humans on the International Space Station since 2000 . These milestones, along with the advancements in space probes, telescopes, and satellites, have not only expanded our understanding of the universe but also fueled our collective imagination.

Importance of Speed in Space Exploration

As we continue to reach farther into the cosmos, the speed at which we can travel in space becomes increasingly significant . The vast distances between celestial bodies make traditional methods of propulsion, like chemical rockets, insufficient for timely exploration. In order to visit neighboring star systems or even more remote regions of our galaxy, we must develop faster means of transportation that can overcome the limitations of time and distance.

• Higher speeds in space travel offer numerous advantages. For manned missions, faster travel times reduce the duration of exposure to harmful radiation and microgravity, thereby mitigating the negative effects on astronauts’ health.
• For unmanned missions, increased speeds enable us to study more celestial objects within a given timeframe, thereby accelerating our understanding of the universe.
• Furthermore, faster space travel can increase the likelihood of discovering potential habitable worlds and extraterrestrial life forms, ultimately broadening our understanding of life’s origins and the potential for future human settlements.

In this article, we will delve into the current state of space travel technology , examining the fastest propulsion methods available today and t he limitations that define our cosmic speed boundaries . Additionally, we will explore cutting-edge research and development in propulsion technology that may pave the way for rapid advancements in space exploration in the near future.

How Fast Can We Travel in Space with Current Technology

The speed of light: the ultimate limit.

The speed of light, denoted as “c,” is a fundamental constant of nature that plays a critical role in our understanding of the universe. It is approximately 299,792 kilometers per second (km/s) or about 186,282 miles per second (mi/s) in a vacuum. According to Albert Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity, nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, making it the ultimate speed limit for any object in the universe .

This cosmic speed limit has profound implications for space travel. At the speed of light, it would still take over four years to reach the nearest star to our solar system, Proxima Centauri, which is 4.24 light-years away . For perspective, it would take about 6,300 years to cover the same distance using the fastest spacecraft ever launched, the Parker Solar Probe, which reached speeds of up to 700,000 km/h (430,000 mph) during its mission.

Time Dilation and Its Effects on Space Travel

As an object approaches the speed of light, it experiences a phenomenon known as time dilation . Time dilation is a consequence of the Special Theory of Relativity, which states that time appears to slow down for an object in motion relative to an observer at rest . The faster the object moves, the more pronounced the time dilation effect becomes.

For space travel, this means that as a spacecraft’s speed increases, the flow of time onboard the spacecraft slows down compared to the flow of time for an observer on Earth. For example, if a spacecraft were to travel at a speed close to the speed of light, a journey that lasts a few years for the astronauts onboard might equate to several decades or even centuries for observers back on Earth.

Time dilation introduces unique challenges for interstellar missions, particularly manned ones. While astronauts traveling at relativistic speeds might age more slowly than their counterparts on Earth, they would return to a world that has aged significantly more than they have. This effect poses challenges not only for the psychological and emotional well-being of astronauts but also for the planning and execution of long-duration space missions.

Chemical Propulsion: The Traditional Method

Chemical propulsion has been the backbone of space travel since its inception . It relies on the combustion of chemical propellants to produce thrust, propelling a spacecraft forward. Chemical rockets, such as the Saturn V that carried the Apollo astronauts to the Moon and the Space Shuttle’s main engines, have demonstrated impressive capabilities in lifting heavy payloads and enabling human spaceflight.

However, chemical propulsion has significant limitations.

• First, the propellant mass required to generate thrust contributes to a large portion of a rocket’s total mass, making it less efficient for long-distance travel. The Tsiolkovsky rocket equation demonstrates this challenge , highlighting that the required fuel increases exponentially as the desired change in velocity (delta-v) increases. Consequently, a large amount of fuel is needed to achieve high speeds, which in turn increases the spacecraft’s mass and demands even more fuel.
• Second, chemical rockets have a relatively low specific impulse , a measure of propulsion system efficiency. The specific impulse of chemical rockets is limited by the energy content of the chemical propellants and the temperature constraints of the combustion process. This limitation translates to lower achievable speeds compared to other propulsion methods, such as electric or nuclear propulsion.

Achievable Speeds with Chemical Propulsion

The speeds achievable with chemical propulsion depend on the type of rocket, the propellant used, and the mission profile. Generally, chemical rockets can reach speeds of up to 40,000 km/h (25,000 mph) or more . For example, the New Horizons probe , which was launched in 2006 to study Pluto and the Kuiper Belt, achieved a speed of about 58,000 km/h (36,000 mph) using chemical propulsion .

Iconic Missions Using Chemical Rockets

Many iconic missions in space exploration have relied on chemical propulsion.

• The Apollo program , which landed astronauts on the Moon between 1969 and 1972 , used the Saturn V rocket, a chemical rocket that remains t he tallest, heaviest, and most powerful rocket ever flown .
• Another well-known example is the Space Shuttle , which operated from 1981 to 2011 , using a combination of solid rocket boosters and liquid-fueled main engines for its propulsion.

While chemical propulsion has been instrumental in many groundbreaking space missions, its limitations in efficiency and achievable speeds highlight the need for alternative propulsion methods to enable more ambitious space exploration endeavors.

Ion Propulsion: The Electric Alternative

Ion propulsion , also known as electric propulsion , offers a promising alternative to traditional chemical propulsion systems. Ion thrusters work by ionizing a neutral gas, typically xenon or argon, and then accelerating the charged particles (ions) through an electric field to produce thrust . Since ion thrusters do not rely on combustion, they can achieve much higher specific impulse compared to chemical rockets , making them more fuel-efficient and capable of achieving higher speeds over long durations.

Advantages and Limitations of Ion Propulsion

Ion propulsion offers several advantages over chemical propulsion:

• Higher specific impulse: Ion thrusters have a much higher specific impulse, meaning they can generate more thrust per unit of propellant mass. This results in significant fuel savings and allows spacecraft to carry more scientific instruments or cargo.
• Long operational lifetimes: Ion thrusters can operate continuously for years, enabling spacecraft to maintain thrust for extended periods and achieve higher speeds over time.
• Reduced mass: Due to their fuel efficiency, ion propulsion systems can substantially reduce the overall mass of a spacecraft, leading to cost savings during launch and increased mission flexibility.

However, ion propulsion also has some limitations:

• Low thrust: Ion thrusters produce relatively low levels of thrust compared to chemical rockets. This makes them unsuitable for time-sensitive missions or those requiring high acceleration, such as launching a spacecraft from Earth’s surface.
• Power requirements: Ion propulsion systems require a significant amount of electrical power, typically provided by solar panels or nuclear reactors. This can add complexity and weight to a spacecraft’s design.

Successful Missions Using Ion Propulsion

Ion propulsion has been successfully employed in several space missions, showcasing its potential for deep space exploration:

• Deep Space 1: Launched in 1998, NASA’s Deep Space 1 was the first mission to use ion propulsion as its primary propulsion system. The spacecraft tested several advanced technologies, including the NSTAR ion thruster, which propelled it to a successful flyby of asteroid 9969 Braille and comet Borrelly.
• Dawn: The Dawn mission, launched in 2007, used ion propulsion to visit and study two large objects in the asteroid belt, Vesta and Ceres. The spacecraft’s ion thrusters allowed it to enter and exit orbits around both celestial bodies, a feat that would have been impossible with conventional chemical propulsion due to the amount of fuel required.
• Hayabusa and Hayabusa2: The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) employed ion propulsion for its Hayabusa missions, which aimed to collect and return samples from asteroids. Hayabusa, launched in 2003, successfully returned samples from asteroid 25143 Itokawa in 2010. Hayabusa2, launched in 2014, collected samples from asteroid 162173 Ryugu and returned them to Earth in 2020.

Solar Sails: Harnessing the Power of the Sun

Solar sails represent an innovative propulsion method that utilizes the power of sunlight to propel spacecraft. These sails are made of lightweight, highly reflective materials, such as Mylar or Kapton , that capture the momentum of photons emitted by the Sun. As photons strike the sail, they transfer their momentum to the spacecraft, generating a small but continuous force that propels it forward. Unlike chemical or ion propulsion, solar sails require no propellant, making them an attractive option for long-duration missions .

Achievable Speeds and Limitations of Solar Sail Technology

Solar sails can achieve significant speeds over time due to the continuous and propellant-free nature of their propulsion . Theoretically, solar sails could reach speeds of up to hundreds of thousands of kilometers per hour , depending on the sail’s size, mass, and distance from the Sun. However, the actual speeds achieved will depend on various factors, including the sail’s design, the spacecraft’s mass, and mission constraints.

Despite their potential, solar sails also have limitations:

• Diminishing thrust with distance: As a spacecraft travels farther from the Sun, the intensity of sunlight decreases, reducing the thrust generated by the solar sail. This makes solar sails less effective for missions to the outer solar system and beyond.
• Low initial thrust: Solar sails generate relatively low thrust, especially when compared to chemical rockets. This means they are not suitable for time-sensitive missions or those requiring rapid acceleration.
• Deployment and control challenges: Designing, deploying, and controlling large, lightweight solar sails present significant engineering challenges,as they need to be carefully unfolded in space and controlled to maintain the correct orientation relative to the Sun. Additionally, space debris and micrometeoroids pose a risk to the sail’s delicate structure, potentially compromising its performance.

Notable Solar Sail Missions

Several solar sail missions have been launched to demonstrate the viability and potential of this propulsion method:

IKAROS: Launched in 2010 by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), IKAROS (Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation Of the Sun) was the first spacecraft to successfully demonstrate solar sail propulsion in interplanetary space. The spacecraft used a 14-meter (46 ft) diagonal square sail to propel itself during its mission to Venus and beyond.

LightSail: Developed by The Planetary Society, the LightSail project aimed to demonstrate controlled solar sail propulsion in Earth orbit. LightSail 1, launched in 2015, was a proof-of-concept mission that successfully deployed its solar sail but did not achieve controlled propulsion. LightSail 2, launched in 2019, successfully deployed its solar sail and demonstrated controlled solar sailing, adjusting its orbit using only the pressure of sunlight.

These missions highlight the potential of solar sail technology for propellant-free propulsion in space. With continued research and development, solar sails could play an increasingly important role in future space exploration, enabling missions to distant celestial bodies and even interstellar travel.

Nuclear Propulsion: The Untapped Potential

Nuclear propulsion offers a promising alternative to traditional propulsion methods for long-distance space travel . There are two primary concepts of nuclear propulsion: nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) and nuclear electric propulsion (NEP).

Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP):

NTP systems use a nuclear reactor to heat a propellant, typically hydrogen, to high temperatures. The heated propellant is then expelled through a nozzle to generate thrust. NTP offers a higher specific impulse than chemical propulsion systems and can provide greater thrust than electric propulsion systems, making it an attractive option for crewed missions to Mars and beyond.

Nuclear Electric Propulsion (NEP):

NEP systems use a nuclear reactor to generate electricity, which is then used to power electric propulsion systems, such as ion or Hall-effect thrusters . NEP offers a higher specific impulse than NTP systems but typically generates lower thrust. This makes NEP well-suited for long-duration, uncrewed missions with lower acceleration requirements.

Speed Capabilities and Advantages of Nuclear Propulsion

Nuclear propulsion offers several advantages over traditional propulsion methods, including increased speed capabilities:

• Higher specific impulse: Both NTP and NEP systems have a higher specific impulse than chemical propulsion, resulting in increased fuel efficiency and reduced mass requirements for long-duration missions.
• Greater thrust: NTP systems can generate higher thrust levels than ion propulsion systems, enabling faster transit times for crewed missions.
• Continuous operation: Nuclear reactors can operate continuously for years, allowing spacecraft to maintain thrust for extended periods and achieve higher speeds over time. This makes nuclear propulsion particularly suitable for deep space missions, where the constant acceleration can reduce travel times significantly compared to conventional propulsion systems.
• Scalability: Nuclear propulsion systems can be scaled up to accommodate larger spacecraft and payloads, providing a viable option for ambitious missions that require significant power and propulsion capabilities.

Current Research and Development in Nuclear Propulsion Technology

There is ongoing research and development aimed at advancing nuclear propulsion technology and overcoming the challenges associated with its implementation:

• NASA’s Space Nuclear Propulsion Project : In collaboration with the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA is working on the development of nuclear propulsion systems for potential crewed missions to Mars. The project focuses on demonstrating the feasibility, safety, and performance of NTP systems, with the goal of enabling faster transit times and increased mission flexibility.
• DARPA’s DRACO Program : The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has initiated the DRACO (Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations) program, which aims to develop and demonstrate a high-assay, low-enriched uranium (HALEU) nuclear thermal propulsion system. The program seeks to enable rapid maneuverability for spacecraft in cislunar space, enhancing the United States’ capabilities in this strategic domain.
• ROSATOM’s Nuclear Electric Propulsion Project : Russia’s state atomic energy corporation, ROSATOM, is working on a nuclear electric propulsion system for deep space missions. The project aims to develop a megawatt-class space nuclear power plant that could power high-efficiency electric propulsion systems, potentially enabling faster and more efficient interplanetary missions.

Breakthrough Propulsion Technologies: A Glimpse into the Future

While current propulsion technologies have allowed us to explore our solar system, more advanced concepts are being studied to enable even faster and farther-reaching space travel. Some of these futuristic propulsion methods include antimatter propulsion and warp drive , which are still in the theoretical and experimental stages.

• Antimatter Propulsion: Antimatter propulsion systems rely on the immense energy released when matter and antimatter particles come into contact and annihilate each other. In theory, this could provide an extremely efficient propulsion method, with specific impulses far beyond those achievable with chemical, electric, or nuclear propulsion. However, producing, storing, and controlling antimatter remain significant challenges that need to be overcome before such a propulsion system could become a reality.
• Warp Drive: Inspired by the concept of faster-than-light travel popularized in science fiction, warp drive envisions a method of space travel that involves bending spacetime around a spacecraft, allowing it to effectively “jump” vast distances instantaneously. While the idea is based on the principles of general relativity, there are currently no known methods to create the required spacetime distortions, and the concept remains purely theoretical at this stage.

Theoretical Speeds Achievable with Breakthrough Technologies

The speeds achievable with breakthrough propulsion technologies, if realized, could be orders of magnitude higher than those possible with current methods:

• Antimatter Propulsion: The energy released during matter-antimatter annihilation is extremely high, potentially enabling speeds approaching a significant fraction of the speed of light. This would allow for interstellar travel within human timescales, making it possible to explore nearby star systems.
• Warp Drive: If a feasible method for creating and controlling spacetime distortions were discovered, warp drive could, in theory, enable faster-than-light travel, revolutionizing our understanding of space exploration and potentially opening up the entire galaxy for human exploration.

Current Research and Development Status

Although these advanced propulsion concepts hold tremendous promise, they are still in the early stages of research and development:

• Antimatter Propulsion: While some preliminary experiments have been conducted on producing and storing antimatter, the quantities produced are minuscule, and the technology for controlling and utilizing antimatter for propulsion is still in its infancy. Research in this area is ongoing, but practical antimatter propulsion systems remain a distant possibility.
• Warp Drive: Current research on warp drive is primarily theoretical, focusing on finding solutions to the complex problems associated with bending spacetime. Experimental verification of these ideas is still far beyond our current technological capabilities, and it is unclear if warp drive can ever become a practical means of propulsion.

While breakthrough propulsion technologies offer tantalizing glimpses into the future of space travel, significant scientific and engineering challenges must be overcome before they can be realized. In the meantime, the ongoing development of existing propulsion methods, such as ion, solar sail, and nuclear propulsion, will continue to push the boundaries of human space exploration.

In conclusion, the quest for faster and more efficient space travel remains an ongoing endeavor that continues to captivate scientists, engineers, and visionaries alike. Current propulsion technologies, such as chemical, ion, solar sail, and nuclear propulsion, have opened up our solar system to exploration and will continue to improve as research and development progress. Meanwhile, breakthrough propulsion concepts, like antimatter propulsion and warp drive, offer tantalizing glimpses into a future where interstellar travel could become a reality. As our understanding of the universe expands and our technological capabilities advance, the potential for faster and farther-reaching space travel will continue to push the boundaries of human exploration and our pursuit of new frontiers in the cosmos.

• Antimatter Propulsion
• Chemical Propulsion
• Ion Propulsion
• Nuclear Propulsion
• Solar Sails
• Space Travel

I am an avid reader of Science News & keep myself up to date about the latest happenings in the world of science. For the last 5 years, I have been managing the content curated by the top science news app "Science News Daily". In these 5 years, I have learned a lot & will be sharing my insights about the latest happenings in the science world.

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Maps of the April 2024 Total Solar Eclipse

By Jonathan Corum

On April 8, the moon will slip between the Earth and the sun, casting a shadow across a swath of North America: a total solar eclipse.

By cosmic coincidence, the moon and the sun appear roughly the same size in the sky. When the moon blocks the glare of the sun, the sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona, will be briefly visible.

Below are several maps of the eclipse’s path as well as images of what you might experience during the event.

Where Can I See the Total Eclipse?

The eclipse will begin at sunrise over the Pacific Ocean, then cut through Mexico and cross the United States from Texas to Maine. Most of North America will see a partial eclipse, but viewers within the deepest shadow — a band sliding from Mazatlán, Mexico, to the Newfoundland coast near Gander, Canada — will experience a total solar eclipse.

Percentage of

the sun obscured

during the eclipse

Indianapolis

Little Rock

San Antonio

Viewers inside the path of the total eclipse may notice a drop in temperature , a lull or shift in the wind , the appearance of bright planets in the sky, and the quieting of birds and other wildlife.

Many cities lie inside the path of the total eclipse, as shown below, the width of which varies from 108 miles to 122 miles.

5:13 p.m. NDT

20% partial eclipse

NEWFOUNDLAND

SASKATCHEWAN

Fredericton

4:33 p.m. ADT

3:26 p.m. EDT

3:20 p.m. EDT

Minneapolis

3:18 p.m. EDT

3:13 p.m. EDT

San Francisco

90% partial eclipse

3:05 p.m. EDT

Los Angeles

1:51 p.m. CDT

1:40 p.m. CDT

1:33 p.m. CDT

12:16 p.m. CST

12:12 p.m. CST

11:07 a.m. MST

Mexico City

EL SALVADOR

12:23 p.m. CST

1:36 p.m. CDT

3:09 p.m. EDT

3:27 p.m. EDT

Explore our interactive cloud outlook for eclipse viewing times and average cloud data at your location.

What Will I See?

A composite image of the 2017 solar eclipse over Madras, Ore.

Aubrey Gemignani/NASA

If the sky is clear, viewers in the path of the total eclipse should see a “diamond ring” effect a few seconds before and after the total eclipse, as the edge of the sun slips in and out of view.

The “diamond ring” effect during the 2017 solar eclipse.

Rami Daud/NASA, Alcyon Technical Services

The sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona, is normally hidden by the sun’s glare. These tendrils and sheets of gas, heated to a million degrees Fahrenheit or more, are in constant motion and shaped by the sun’s swirling magnetic field.

The sun’s corona during the 2017 solar eclipse.

The sun is relatively active this year and is nearing the expected peak of its 11-year solar cycle . Researchers at Predictive Science are using data about the sun’s magnetic field to predict and model a dramatic corona for the April eclipse.

A prediction of how the sun’s corona might appear during the April 8 total eclipse.

Predictive Science

What Colors Should I Wear?

As the sky darkens, light-sensitive cells in human eyes become more sensitive to blue and green hues than to reds and oranges. This shift in color perception is known as the Purkinje effect , after a 19th-century Czech scientist, and is typically seen at twilight.

Watching the 2017 total eclipse at Southern Illinois University.

Andrea Morales for The New York Times

To take advantage of the Purkinje effect, Solar Eyeglasses suggests wearing green clothes or a contrasting combination of greens and reds. Blue-green colors (shorter wavelengths) will appear brighter, while red colors (longer wavelengths) will appear to recede into the darkness.

What If I Miss It?

The next two total solar eclipses in the United States won’t occur until 2044 and 2045 . But eclipse chasers might catch one in 2026 in Greenland, Iceland and Spain; 2027 along the coast of Northern Africa; 2028 in Australia and New Zealand; or 2030 across Southern Africa and Australia.

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April 8 could be your best opportunity to see a total solar eclipse for decades. But if clouds fill the sky, you may miss the spectacle.

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Our Coverage of the Total Solar Eclipse

Dress for the Occasion:  What should you wear for the eclipse? Our fashion critic weighs the options , including an unexpected suggestion from scientists.

Free to View:  Six inmates in upstate New York prisons who sued the state won their lawsuit to view the eclipse , arguing it “is a religious event.” But a statewide prison lockdown during the eclipse will remain in place.

Hearing the Eclipse:  A device called LightSound is being distributed to help the blind and visually impaired experience what they can’t see .

Sky-High Hotel Prices: One Super 8 hotel in the eclipse’s path is charging $949 a night . Its normal rate is $95.

Animal Reactions : Researchers will watch if animals at zoos, homes and farms act strangely  when day quickly turns to night.

A Rare Return:  A total solar eclipse happens twice in the same place every 366 years on average. But people in certain areas will encounter April 8’s eclipse  about seven years after they were near the middle of the path of the “Great American Eclipse.”

 No Power Outages:  When the sky darkens during the eclipse, electricity production in some parts of the country will drop so sharply that it could theoretically leave tens of millions of homes in the dark. In practice, hardly anyone will notice  a sudden loss of energy.

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