You are not logged in.
No, it really wouldn't be any cheaper then accelerators.
Not enough energy available on Earth for large quantities of antimatter, at any cost.
So have to look other places in the Solar System, Sun, maybe around Jupiter ?
It takes several seconds for charged particles to go back and forth in the Van Allen Belt.
If a craft moved along magnetic lines a good portion could be intercepted.
Mother ship used to predict the Sun and coordinate the collector craft.
The collector craft would need to focus the incoming anti protons as a TV tube does, electronically, Slowed down then stored. Force on opposite charge is opposite, so anti particles are deflected in opposite directions.
Earth's proton belt would be a good place to test capture and storage.
Offline
Can't do that either
Only a magnetic field "funnel" is practical to collect the antimatter, because an electric field is much harder to produce: with a magnet you can generate huge power levels easily with SC magnets (which has no resistance), but an electric field you have to increase voltage. And that you can't do very far.
Anyway, if you use a magnetic funnel, it will in and concentrate regular protons just like it will anti-protons, which will collide and annihilate eachother in the "neck" of the funnel before reaching the collector. There won't be anything left to seperate.
Again, if your funnel is not very wide, you will never capture much of anything.
I am skeptical about a fleet of antimatter collectors surviving the intense radiation of the Van Allen or the far more intense Jupiter's magnetic fields.
Even if you did get it to work to an extent, building such vehicles and putting them in high orbit would be expensive and never be economical for large-scale spaceflight.
Antimatter technology in general is simply not the answer for this centuries' spaceflight needs.
[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]
[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]
Offline
To me it seems that the answer for mass-production of anti-matter lies neither in gathering naturaly occuring anti-matter (which I agree would be impratical/impossible), or our current methods of production, which generaly involve partical accelerator collisions, which is far to expensive. For anti-matter mass production to become possible some new way of creating it must be developed.
However, I would also be quick to point out that anti-matter is a total flop as an energy SOURCE. The very best efficency you could get at making it is 50% or twice the amount of energy it contains. It could make a fantastic energy store, but it is not a power source, that energy to create it is going to have to come from someplace else.
To me unless some-crazy new anti-matter production method is found, the most logical use for it is as a catalist for various nuclear reactions.
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Offline
To me it seems that the answer for mass-production of anti-matter lies neither in gathering naturaly occuring anti-matter (which I agree would be impratical/impossible), or our current methods of production, which generaly involve partical accelerator collisions, which is far to expensive. For anti-matter mass production to become possible some new way of creating it must be developed.
However, I would also be quick to point out that anti-matter is a total flop as an energy SOURCE. The very best efficency you could get at making it is 50% or twice the amount of energy it contains. It could make a fantastic energy store, but it is not a power source, that energy to create it is going to have to come from someplace else.
To me unless some-crazy new anti-matter production method is found, the most logical use for it is as a catalist for various nuclear reactions.
For intra solar system travel nuclear makes the most sence. If we are traveling to other starts then we will need much higher specific impulses. In my opinion the most efficient way to store energy would be regular matter and it would be converted to energy by a primordial black hole. That is the is a black hole that it is small enough to radiate a significant amount of energy per mass. The radiation would be maintained by feeding it with a continuous stream of matter.
It is theorized that in the near future that particle accelerators will produce enough energy to create a miniature black hole but only for a very short period of time.
Dig into the [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/2006/12/political-grab-bag.html]political grab bag[/url] at [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/]Child Civilization[/url]
Offline
Yeah, antimatter as the primary power source for propulsion is never going to happen without a different way to create it and preferably a passive way to store it. Even little 200kg antimatter sail probes require too much of the stuff.
I am also fairly skeptical about using antimatter to initiate other nuclear reactions (MCAF for example) because of how everything has to work just right with little margin of error, and the antimatter reaction produces ultrahigh energy gamma rays that are hard to block. Low thrust and flimsy structure too. And then there is the launch safety issue.
A black hole? Um? Isn't that a little bit far out? That sounds like a really difficult way to push a space ship. How do you move a black hole anyway?
[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]
[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]
Offline
A black hole? Um? Isn't that a little bit far out? That sounds like a really difficult way to push a space ship. How do you move a black hole anyway?
Far out yes but so are some aniti-mater concepts. So by the time some of these anti matter concepts are who knows what else we will be able to do. To move the black hole use a simple momentum exchange (feed it from behind) or maybe keep it charged and move it with magnetic fields.
Anyone, know much about Hawking radiation. For instance can the plot a graph of power output relative to black hole mass. Another one perhaps of power output relative to black hole radius. We need the radius so we know how precise we need to be with the particle stream feed.
Dig into the [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/2006/12/political-grab-bag.html]political grab bag[/url] at [url=http://child-civilization.blogspot.com/]Child Civilization[/url]
Offline
Still needs to be answered if there are favourable antiproton concentration eventsts in the Solar System. Near natural magnetic mirrors, where velocity is lowest, seems like a good place to investigate. Cosmic antiprotons, sufficiently focused by the Sun's gravity, for convenient collection ?
http://www.copernicus.org/COSPAR/colloq … hc0023.pdf
"The result is as surprising as gold miners blasting a cliff face and discovering that the explosion threw all the dirt in one direction and all the gold in another direction,"
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/new … hessi.html
It is theorized that in the near future that particle accelerators will produce enough energy to create a miniature black hole but only for a very short period of time.
And there may be a way to control the resulting products of the black hole.
Storing antiprotons:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=& … tnG=Search
Offline
In reading some scientific literature on Anti-Matter creation, some calibration
on the subject is indicated.
Currently the capacity of the best Accelerator produces some fraction of
1x10^7 anti-hydrogen atoms per year. This means that that faciltiy would take 2 billion years to produce 1 KG of anti-matter.
Even asuming you built 25 installations and maybe quadruple their efficiency output Using only twice as much energy, that is still only 1KG of anti-matter / 20 million years. The energy required to run these Facillties 24/7 would probably approach the output of a 30MW a medium sized Generating plant.
Even if your are looking to create enough fuel for a mars trip, the figure i've
heard is 10-15 milligrams of fuel. Assuming the lower threshold. that is
still takes 200,000 years to produce.
It's clear to me that producing Anti-matter fuel will not feasable until at the
very least Fusion power comes along, and at that point you design fusion
powered ships, not Anti-matter powered ones, for Solar system travel.
Fusion however has turned out to be the perpetual motion machine of the modern age. Institutions come very close every year, but not are able to create more energy than they consume with their gizmos.
The more I think of it, the more I think that any Fast Interstellar probe will have
to journey inward toward the sun to redezvouz with a Anti-matter fueling facility
just inside the orbit of mercury.
Offline
Will take time
http://www.engr.psu.edu/antimatter/Papers/NASA_anti.pdf
http://www.google.com/search?client=ope … 8&oe=utf-8
Giant accelerators in space. Laser and microwave aimed at antiproton rich parts on the Sun to push antiprotons into safe collecting spots.
Hydrogen bombs specially tuned for proton emission. In space, gather the right mixture in a setup to capture antiprotons. Then ignite with concentrated sunlight, lasers, microwaves and hydrogen bombs.
Offline
This is all far future talk. The ablative nozzle concept might be good for NSWR systems, that would be more energetic.
Time to stick with CaLV and Chemical systems.
All this anti-matter talk sounds like some back door attempt to keep the white coats in labs and to sabotage the infrastructure of VSE.
"Well, if we cut VSE and got rid of Griffin, look what we could do>"
I've had enough of spacecraft on screens and simulations.
It's time to bend metal.
Offline
It's time to bend metal
Dreaming of Mars
But stuck in the Mud
There is no concensus
Offline