Is warp drive next?


PR release or actual news? Potentially one of the most important stories of the century.
Not sure how true this one is, but it could be absolutely amazing.

The aerospace industry has taken notice of a California researcher who, using off-the-shelf components, built and successfully demonstrated the world's first successful amplified photon thruster. Dr. Young Bae of the Bae Institute first demonstrated his Photonic Laser Thruster (PLT) with an amplification factor of 3,000 in December, 2006.

Major aerospace agencies and primary contractors have since invited Bae to present his work, including NASA JPL, DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), and AFRL (Air Force Research Laboratory). Senior Aerospace Engineer at AFRL, Dr. Franklin Mead, "Dr. Bae's PLT demonstration and measurement of photon thrust (is) pretty incredible. I don't think anyone has done this before. It has generated a lot of interest."

Recently, the Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets, a peer-reviewed AIAA (American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics) (http://www.aiaa.org) Journal, accepted Dr. Bae's PLT demonstration paper, "Photonic Laser Propulsion: Proof-of-Concept Demonstration" for publication this year. In his paper Bae documents in explicit detail how he overcame the inherent inefficiencies of traditional photon thrusters in generating thrust by amplification with the use of an innovative optical cavity concept. For decades rocket scientists have tried to overcome the inefficiency of photon thrusters by amplification based on optical cavities separated from laser sources, but failed. In contrast, Bae's patent-pending PLT breakthrough places the laser medium within a resonant optical cavity between two platforms to produce a very stable and reliable thrust that is unaffected by mirror movement and vibration -- ideal for spacecraft control or propulsion.

A practical and reliable photon drive could be a major shot in the arm for liberty. It would make cheap intrasteller (within the solar system) travel possible. Theoretically, outside of a gravity well, a photon drive is more efficient and less mass-intensive than chemical rockets.

Which means that once you are in Earth orbit, most of your mass isn't fuel that you have to burn up and throw away.

I've long considered a practical (read cheap and reliable) space drive to be part of the technology troika that could well and truly make us Homo astra, a species of star travelers.

If you are curious, the other two parts are distributed computer networks and nanotechnology. When it is no longer possible for a government or corporate entity to control information flow, that is when we will know that distributed computer networks are a mature technology. We're well on our way to that goal.

And nanotechnology, well, when that hits, it will be faster than even the information revolution has been.

But getting back the photon drive, I think I will say what every engineer, every science fiction fan, and every forward looking capitalist will say.

"I want one!"

— NeoWayland

Posted: Wed - September 26, 2007 at 03:13 PM  Tag


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