Pluto Realms

Void · 2018-05-30 13:14:14

I at first was not at all enthusiastic about what could be done with Pluto, Charon, and the small moons of the system.

However, in a solar civilization, I now see that metals and other non-icy materials could be sent to Pluto/Charon to start up a subpart of that civilization.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto
Quote:

New Horizons observations showed that atmospheric escape of nitrogen to be 10,000 times less than expected.[121] Alan Stern has contended that even a small increase in Pluto's surface temperature can lead to exponential increases in Pluto's atmospheric density; from 18 hPa to as much as 280 hPa (three times that of Mars to a quarter that of the Earth). At such densities, nitrogen could flow across the surface as liquid.

So, I gather if a relatively small amount of additional energy were added to the atmosphere of Pluto, perhaps an air pressure suitable to humans. Still a tricky environment, liquid Nitrogen rivers and such. But not that much worse than Saturn's moon Titan.

As for atmospheric loss, if that is somehow a concern, then an artificial magnetic field perhaps to help retain atmosphere.

......

As for metals and other non-icy materials, I suggest mass producing tiny robot spacecraft that can navigate on the solar wind. One possible electrical power source for them would be the difference between their speed and that of the solar wind.

The intention is that they would impact themselves to an atmosphere or surface of Pluto or one of it's moons.

The way this would be paid for would be in the building of habitats for humans to move to.

However, in the long term, I would want to mine Charon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charon

I am aware that the ice layer is very thick. However, I am thinking it could be removed to a new moon, or synthetic gravity machines.

The new moon would be so large that it could have a sea inside. Inside the sea, human habitats.

Once the ice had been sufficiently removed from Charon, then a sea would be established with a pressure on the rocky surface of Charon of pressures tolerable to mining. Over time, the pressure could be reduced to an average of 1 Bar.

So, then if humans could rise to such a level of ability then Kepler belt Dwarf planets of a small size could become sources of minerals.

Then off to the Oort cloud.

Energy for this? Well some would say solar concentrating mirrors, but I am guessing that fusion will eventually become a human ability.

I am interested in the Barycenter between Pluto and Charon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barycenter
Quote:

When the two bodies are of similar masses, the barycenter will generally be located between them and both bodies will follow an orbit around it. This is the case for Pluto and Charon,

So, the question is if the atmosphere of Pluto were inflated to 1 bar, (If that is possible), would the Barycenter be within the atmosphere of Pluto? If so, then could you fly a winged aircraft to the barycenter? Just items of curiosity.

Done

Last edited by Void (2018-05-30 13:38:09)

tahanson43206 · 2024-10-23 20:43:38

This post is reserved for an index to posts that may be contributed by NewMars members over time...

Index:

https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 65#p231865
Calliban: report of new candidate dwarf planet: 2017OF201

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2024-10-23 20:46:32

An unexpected article about Pluto showed up in the Internet feed...

This article is from the Smithsonian Institution...

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- … wtab-en-us

The article includes a number of images.

One quote caught my eye ... Pluto and it's moon Charon may be habitable, in the sense that they have plenty of useful elements, and Pluto appears to have an internal heat source that may sustain a liquid ocean under the surface.

(th)

Void · 2024-10-24 20:00:46

Pluto/Charon is interesting. Apparently due to heavy molecules formed in the atmosphere of Pluto, it can hold on to it's Nitrogen.

It seems that Charon's crust may contain a minority of Silicates according to some theories.

With fusion this could be very useful.

Ending Pending

Calliban · Yesterday 05:02:57

Introducing 2017OF201, the solar system's most recently discovered dwarf planet candidate.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_OF201

This object has a highly eccentric orbit. Its perihelion is 44AU. Its aphelion is an enormous 1600AU. It may in fact be a scattered body from the inner Oort cloud.

Whilst these objects may not at first appear to be promissing places to live, they have the advantage of being heat sinks. One of the limitations on free space habitats, us the need to dump waste heat into space, which can only be done by radiation. This limits the size and density of habitats, as radiator area ends up dominating the size of the structure. With a heat sink, these limitations are removed.

Imagine building an O'Neil cylinder 20km wide and 50km long. The internal surface area would be about 3000km2, about the size of a county. Now imagine decking the inside, with 10m between decks. Internal land area is then 1.5million km2. That is about half the size of the continental US. Such internal subdivision would be impractical in free space, because the waste heat generated by the lighting of this much land would require a radiator hundreds of thousands of square km in area. But if we build our hab on an icy body, we can pump water through it and use the volume of the body as a place to dump heat. Such a large and cold body would take many tens of thousands of years to melt.

Last edited by Calliban (Yesterday 05:11:57)

Void · Yesterday 11:28:35

It is always possible that I do not understand correctly. It seems to have been said that for most of its orbit, the object could not have been detected from Earth with current technology. So, that suggests to me that there could be an enormous amount of objects, similar that are not currently observable. But that is not certain at all, it is a maybe at best.

I have on occasion tried to think of a solid radiator. The solid would be first cooled by radiation into the universe, but then would cool a secondary device by contact and conduction.

I do not feel that I can yet offer a potentially practical solution yet.

Obviously, a pile of metal dice on the Moon, could be "Flowed" into a machine and presented to a flat surface to convey their low vibration state onto the plate, then sent back out to the Moons surface to cool again.

Selective magnetism might be helpful, perhaps the dice could be ceramic but with some magnetite inside of them. To do this vacuum welding has to be avoided.

This brings questions about vacuum gap and conduction. Does heat flow into the "Die", only through physical transfer of vibrating molecule to molecule, or is there a radiation transfer across a very small gap?

Will the photons flow from the hot plate to the "Die" because of the proximity of the cold "Die", or must molecular vibration atom to atom be the only way of transfer?

If you have an opinion, I am interested.

Lets go the other way and consider hot marbles. If they are heated, then we cannot use magnetism, most likely as it would be above the curie point.

We could use gravity or synthetic gravity though, I think.

Can we heat up our marbles in a device, such as a solar concentrator and "Flow" them into a storage area?

Here, if we then "Flow" them to a boiler, contact will transfer some heat, but photons from the hot marbles will transfer quite a bit more.

It is not that I think I have a practical machine yet, but a means to visualize some questions.

But I am interested. Technically in microgravity it might be possible to magnetically manipulate the "Dice", to be exposed to the universe to cool, for instance if they heated above the curie point they could be ejected outwards, but upon cooling a magnetic field might suck them back towards the radiator, to make contact.

Again I do not propose that I have created a practical machine, but a set of questions instead.

Isaac Arthur seems to think that Mirrors will work for solar power even in the Kuiper Belt. I would have supposed out to Saturn. If we have fusion or solar, then we may want good radiator method.

A somewhat metal disc might do as well, if the radiator could move on it, and clamp the condenser to the surface, by a force, such as magnetism.

It might be that a practical machine will be created some day.

Ending Pending

Perhaps a solid ring of material which the condenser could physically embrace the small circumference of for the promotion of physical contact. And still I wonder if close proximity promotes faster photon transfer of energy across a very small vacuum gap, or if vibrations must transfer molecule to molecule by touch.

Ending Pending

Last edited by Void (Yesterday 11:55:30)

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