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Author | Topic: Interstellar Travel - Possibilities and Human Physiology | |||||||||||||||||||
Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
4. Presuming we go, what life forms would it be required to tag along? This one interested me the most. First on the list are the life forms that we already take with us everywhere, our normal human flora (e.g. skin flora, gut flora). As for supplementary life forms, a minimum requirement would be seeds for high protein plants such as soy beans that can be planted once you reach the destination or grown hydroponically. For in flight, genetically engineered algae and yeast could serve as a nutrient rich food source. Unicellular life forms are the most effecient and the least picky. I see no reason why we would need large plants or animals in flight to supply food. One could certainly argue that there are psychological reasons that we need plants and animals with us.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
The space probes we have headed out burned for a very short while and have coasted ever since. I am unfamiliar with the "friction of space" concept that would slow them down over time. There are small amounts of interstellar hydrogen, not to mention micrometeors in the Oort clouds and other small dust particles. This would produce drag, but I don't know if it would be significant at relativistic velocities.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
How do we keep muscle tone up for extended periods of time? In the absence of gravity, lots of exercise where force is applied to the person. Modern astronauts strap themselves down to treadmills and bicycles. The bones need to experience a force load in order to keep bone density. This can also be solved by accelerating at >0.5 g or having a cylindrical ship that spins to produce centrifugal force.
Anyone have any ideas on birth in space and the effect on infants? I don't think there would be any problems pre-natal, but I have no idea on post-natal health.
Is artificial gravity a reality or just Sci Fi? The only "artificial" gravity we can produce is centrifugal force. Just think about those carnival rides where the ring of cages spins around and pins you to the back of your little cage.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
What would be a reasonably safe speed? Depends on the shielding. You would need a thick physical barrier to shield you from micrometeors. You would also need shielding from radiation. As Ned points out, at relativistic speeds the amount of deadly radiation increases. I don't know if magnetic shield would suffice for all sources of radiation.
Could a nuclear power plant be feasible? You might need more cadmium control rods if a fission reactor is exposed to external neutron sources, but other than that I don't see why you couldn't use one.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
2. A habitable planet, IMO, will almost definitely be occupied by some life forms. Without any data (nobody has any), I think all planets with appropriate physical conditions will be inhabited. If we are worried about native life forms, we might as well stay home, or stay in space. I think the universe in crawling with life. It's actually simpler than that. In order for a planet to be habitable it must have oxygen. For a planet to have oxygen it must have life. Specifically, it must have photosynthesizers that are producing oxygen. Oxygen is a very reactive element and it disappears quickly if it is not constantly replaced. In fact, our planet has massive iron sediments which marked the emergence of oxygen producers on our planet. The sediments themselves illustrate that lifeless planets will probably have massive oxygen sinks that will have to be filled before oxygen levels can increase in the atmosphere. Short term terraforming will probably be very difficult and energy intensive.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
I'm guessing that you mean habitable by us because otherwise your statement is wrong. Since we are the travellers of interest, I thought this was assumed.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
Hmm, I am trying to imagine how we can use the slingshot method for deceleration without in the process further accelerating the velocity of this spacecraft and slinging it further into interstellar space. The gravity assist is actually given by the planets orbital speed. If you are going with the movement of the planet then it's velocity can be added to yours. If you are going in the opposite direction then the planet's velocity will be subtracted.
Wiki link For powered gravity assist with a static object the gravity assist is due to the loss of propellant. Think of sand bagging with bungee jumping. Jump off the bridge with sand bags and let go of the sand bags at the bottom of the fall. You will spring up with more velocity.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
"This is conceptually plausable according to the laws of physics I suppose. However, the problem I see with this is more of an issue with human intolerance to high g-forces. How can we go from near c speeds (or even 0.5 c) to 0 without creating insanely high g-forces? I would imagine that even to get captured by a solar system's gravity and be swung aroung to reduce it's velocity (like a comet captured by the sun) would still entail high g-force. Any one have a solution to this problem?" First off, acceleration at 1xg is pretty fast. If you are accelerating at 9.8 m/s^2 it would only take 3 months to get to 0.5 c. For a trip that will take years this isn't a problem. For constant g forces above 1xg we can take a cue from nature, specifically the womb. If you submerge the passengers in water they experience much lower g loads.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
Is being part of humanity as we understand it an intrinsic link to the planet we know and love? Or is it just DNA? It's everything. History, environment, language, society, and oh yes, DNA. Perhaps a way to bridge the gap between the home planet and a freshly seeded population of humans would be anthropomorphic androids trained to raise a new human generation and a vast library containing art, history, primers on human society, etc.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
I was only looking at the reverse slingshot as a means of requiring less fuel for deceleration. It would work, but the savings would be pretty small assuming that you are slowing down from relativistic speeds. It works great for our satellites that are crawling through the solar system, but they aren't going that fast.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
For a space station to build another space station would require a vast amount of raw materials which we would have to get from somewhere. If they aren't available from earth, the space station personel would have to find another moon, asteroid, planet, etc. with all the right resources and set up mining and processing facilities. It is possible but we would need some pretty incredible advances in technology to pull it off. It would seem to me that robotics would work really well for this task. It might be slow at first, but it could really build momentum over time. We might even invent something like a von Neumann machine that can make more copies of itself. This could lead to a exponential increase in resources. Edited by Taq, : No reason given.
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Taq Member Posts: 10085 Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
I don't see how it could increase resources. Please explain.
If your manufacturing robots double in number every year your resources will grow exponentially.
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