Questions tagged [interstellar-travel]
48 questions
24
votes
3 answers
How long does it take to travel 36 light years with tolerable acceleration and deceleration?
The recent discovery of HD85512b only 36 light years from Earth has promising attributes to harbor life. Assuming we want to travel there, we cannot instantaneously jump to light speed, (StarTrek euphemisms aside), we'll have to accelerate the…
giulio
18
votes
5 answers
Does special relativity imply that I can reach a star 100 light years away in less than 100 years?
I am just starting familiarizing myself with special relativity, and want to understand if the following is a correct thought process:
Consider a star that is 100 light years away from Earth, from my perspective, where I am a stationary observer on…
Ishamael
- 291
13
votes
7 answers
John, in his spaceship traveling at relativistic speed, is crossing the Milky Way in 500 years. How many supernovae explosions would he experience?
John, in his spaceship traveling at a stable relativistic speed, is crossing the Milky Way in 500 years of his own time.
How many supernovae explosions would he experience?
From my reference frame on earth, his trip would take 100,000 years, and so,…
Alexandre Bart
- 163
13
votes
2 answers
The interstellar medium reflects extremely low-frequency radio waves. Could we use this fact to build a more efficient photon rocket?
According to the equations of MHD, electromagnetic waves cannot propagate in a plasma if they are below the plasma frequency. (For more information, see this question about astronomical-wavelength radio waves and this question about the plasma…
Thorondor
- 4,110
- 2
- 23
- 46
12
votes
2 answers
So what happens to your personal time and space, exactly, when you get close, or even match, the speed of light?
1g seems to be the value of choice. We get on the ship with sufficient fuel to provide 1g acceleration for a century. Off we go, aiming for some distant star or galaxy. Let's call this star Jeff. Let's further assume that Jeff is exactly 100…
Ricky
- 641
6
votes
1 answer
Finding interplanetary flight trajectory using calculus of variations?
Consider two orbits $x(t),\space y(t)$ representing the origin and destination for some spaceflight of interest. These could be, for example, cycloids describing LEO and another orbit circling, say, the moon or Mars.
Suppose I want to leave at…
Deep Blue
- 1,380
5
votes
3 answers
What sort of propulsion would we require for interstellar travel?
Further to this question I asked recently, lgritz makes a very astute observation about the massive fuel requirements to travel 36 lt yrs with known fuel technology today. So, if conventional rocket fuel is completely impractical, then what are the…
giulio
4
votes
1 answer
At 50% c, I go party to IC1101 galaxy, and back home. How many times can i go before the expansion of the universe will lock me on one side?
Longer version of the question:
Let's say I'm an immortal being (I could be artificial) going to "party" to IC1101, one of the biggest galaxies of the universe, 1 billion light-years away from us, and that the speed of my space ship is 50% c. ("c"…
4
votes
3 answers
how do we navigate space without knowing the position of everything? wouldn't the gravity affect the sattelite/ship?
I tried looking for other questions but I couldn't find any. (if this is a duplicate, then I'm sorry, I just signed up, so I'm not sure what to search for)
I was wondering, how do we navigate into deep space without knowing the position of…
rainbowkitty227
- 155
- 3
4
votes
1 answer
micro black hole forces
A black hole would radiate mass optimally for interstellar-travel applications in the range between $10^7$ and $10^8$ kilograms. Assuming a light-only radiation emission spectrum, with a parabolic reflector with efficiency $f$, this would create an…
lurscher
- 14,933
4
votes
4 answers
How long would it take, using existing technology, to travel 40 light years?
The exciting discovery of 7 earth-like planets 40 light years away raises the following question: If an exploration mission is scheduled to one or more of these planets in 2017 to find a possible home for the future, how long would it take for…
lostsoul29
- 159
4
votes
3 answers
What the live streaming of a time traveler will look like?
Consider a hypothetical situation: In which a time traveler travels in a spaceplane at close to speed of light circling the earth and I get a live telecast of inside of that plane to my television.
How time dilation will effect him and what will I…
Asker
- 41
3
votes
5 answers
Spaceships travelling through space and debris
How can a spaceship travel through space if there is space debris flying around at very high speeds?
Wouldn't even a small rock crack through the spaceship?
Alex
- 509
3
votes
1 answer
How can one feed a small black hole against 1 TW of Hawking radiation's radiation pressure?
This question was inspired by an old post here on meta, about a previous question of the same type that had been removed because it "had too much science fiction", in particular the author added a lot of references to "energy beings" and other…
The_Sympathizer
- 20,929
2
votes
1 answer
How to include the effect of cosmological expansion in the close to speed of light calculations of a relativistic rocket?
I calculated time ago as undergraduated and post it at my blog the calculations for traveling through the Universe in a (special) relativist way. At what level and how should we include the effect of cosmological expansion? What if it is not…
riemannium
- 6,843