Okay, a while back some friends in the table-top gaming world were playing around with some futuristic science fiction concepts, specifically around the future of space travel and even colonization. As a “futurist concept,” one of the things I’ve always played around with was the idea of an electrical thruster based on light pulses, or a “light pulse thruster.”
The Newtonian problem with that you can’t propel something without propellant, like rocket fuel or even explosives. There have, however, been successful tests in creating materials that can move energy through it from one side to another, like those combination hot-or-cold coolers you plug into the wall. It merely moves heat (energy) through a plate either toward the inside (making the inside hot) or to the outside (making the inside cool). If this can move heat/energy, the idea is focusing that energy into some type of thrust.
So far, no one has figured out a way to convert electrical energy directly into thrust without using up a consumable fuel, creating the limitation of no fuel, no go. This brings us to the “Emdive,” a Chinese concept that is essentially a power source hooked up to a nozzle that will, theoretically, create thrust. Most physicists say it cannot work based on everything I just said above (and a few more technical reasons, too), but if it DOES work, it would revolutionized the space industry and everything from manned space flight to interplanetary travel.
Crap. I could have made a fortune… if it works!
Orignal From: Dang, I Should Have Patented the M-Drive
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